Lydia DePersia

I am not understanding why Johns Hopkins (one of the best hospitals in the US) is afflilated with this hospital. Just had a family member discharged yesterday. A stroke patient gets put in a chair at 10 am and told that they can go home. The family is told it will take about 2 hours to complete the discharge process and prepare discharge papers, instructions, medications etc. 6 (six) hours later and still in the chair, they finally complete the process. During the patients 10 day stay, she developed a bed sore. No one checking for common things that happen with many patients. In order to tolerate the medication and get stronger, we were told she must eat her food. She is not able to feed herself (due to the temporary effects of the stroke). All of her meals are brought and left on the tray. She needs to drink water but no one brings water to her. No one in sight to assist (when family is not physically in the room). Uneaten food trays are removed and no one questions why the food is not eaten. Medication is prescribed without regard to side effects and other medications that conflict with each other. A medication is given that can cause STROKE. The medication causes her to be so out of it she can barely communicate or keep her eyes open. NOTE: Stroke did not affect her speech. Maybe a stoned patient is easier to care for. No one is held accountable. The list is very long....... For expats in Panama THIS IS NOT AN AMERICAN HOSPITAL. Although they claim to have English speaking staff, only the doctors spoke to us in English and a customer service rep who helps with the English speaking patients. There seems to be only 1 in the entire hospital at any given time. The staff who are hands on with the patients do not speak English and claim they do not have a phone to use Google translate. When a patient requests something it can take hours for someone to bring it or respond. It is nowhere near the care you would receive at a mediocre hospital in the US. Someone from the family should stay with the patient 24/7 in order to avoid the most basic of complications. The one thing I can say is that the room was clean when she arrived. Johns Hopkins needs to know about this! The professionalism of the staff is questionable. There are some very caring individuals that work there but they are terrified of losing their jobs so they don't complain. It is very expensive and not at all what we expected. The scary part is that this is the best available in the country of Panama.