One of the scariest things in life is to find out that someone you know (and take note of) is not well and has to be sent to the hospital.
It's not a pleasant phone call to receive.
It's also not a pleasant phone call to make.
Not too long ago a phone call came in to inform that Miss Brown was having a rather high fever and needed to be admitted to hospital
The last time this happened was earlier this year and she was sent to SKGH.
This time they sent her to TTSH.
The phone call came in around 530.
We got there at 8.
I'm not sure how protocols of different hospitals are but here we weren't allowed to enter the A&E- not even her son who had made his way down to be there.
About an hour after, whilst we were having dinner at the mall opposite, a call from the department came in.
Nothing was clear yet, they said, but there was a likelihood that Miss Brown might was suffering from pneumonia.
She would remain under observation in the A&E for a while- with the appropriate care management- until a bed was made available and she could be shifted there.
Next morning- next very early morning- we called the department tto ask- and found out that she'd been admitted to a ward, and a bed there.
I am not familiar with the wards of TTSH, and did not know that Ward 80-something was at the old annex- until afternoon of the same day when we got there.
Neither did I know that most patients in the ward- 86?84?- were pneumatic ones- until the nurse on duty informed me.
One of the things that surprised us when we got there was the bed, or rather, the location of it.
Unlike previous times where she had slept surrounded by other patients and other visitors, this time she was placed by herself alone in a single room there.
We hadn't known that Bed 23 was a single bed in a single room with its own ensuite toilet and its own ensuite bathroom.
I don't think Miss Brown had ever been assigned a room like that.
For the whole weekend that she was in hospital, her son visited her.
So did I.
We however weren't allowed to stay for long- only an hour each time.
The nurses, however, did a fantastic job
When I turned up one evening, a nurse was (patiently) feeding her.
Tests soon determined that Miss Brown did indeed have a lung infection.
So they put her on drip antibiotics for a day or two.
She seemed a little grump about the IV (no surprise there) but she didn't attempt pulling out the needle either and so the antibiotics went in very smooth.
Her son and I alternated between showing her pictures on the tablet and playing Youtube videos.
I think they worked.
At least there was something for her to watch, something for her to listen to.
It helped that the room was comfortable.
Really comfortable.
Not only was it sunny and bright, the air was also crisp and fresh, helped, no doubt, by the presence of the air conditioner in her room, and the air circulation machine right beside her bed.
Miss Brown did not communicate much during those few days that she was there.
Then again she doesn't communicate much at all.
Thankfully, however, her spirits lifted, tests showed the infection was cleared, and four (five?) days after, Miss Brown was discharged and she went back (to the nursing) home.