Nurse fights to be heard after medical emergency kicks off 72-hour hospital odyssey

A Winnipeg nurse who suffered a medical emergency says she was dismissed, denied basic diagnostics and had to fight to be taken seriously during visits to multiple Winnipeg hospitals.

“I followed what I believed to be the right path: I sought medical care promptly and advocated for myself at every turn,” the advanced practice nurse, who has worked in the health-care system for nearly a decade, told the Free Press on Friday.

The nurse, whose name is being withheld for fear of reprisal, said she hit the back of her head last Thursday while at home. Blurry vision in one eye quickly escalated to a grey blind spot.

Her clinical training gave her the confidence to push for answers, but she fears for patients who can’t.

“I still found myself in tears, frightened, and fighting to be heard,” she said.

Over a span of 72 hours, the nurse visited multiple health-care facilities seeking help.

She first went to the eye centre at Misericordia Health Centre on Thursday night, but no doctor was on duty. Told to go to Victoria General Hospital urgent care, she instead went home to rest. When her symptoms worsened later that night, she went to Victoria, but was told the wait would be hours and that there was “no point in staying,” despite saying she’d been referred for a possible brain bleed. She says no one took her name or vitals. She left in tears.

She returned to Misericordia the next morning and a doctor referred her to an ophthalmology clinic. The ophthalmologist, concerned about optic nerve trauma or a brain bleed, sent her to the emergency room at Health Sciences Centre.

There, optic nerve swelling was suspected, but couldn’t be confirmed without an MRI. She says critical treatment was delayed until a neurology resident finally took her case seriously. By then, 48 hours had passed.

“Time during which early intervention could have protected my vision,” she said. “Despite repeated requests for an MRI with contrast, prophylactic steroids, a contrast-enhanced CT, a second ophthalmology consult, and a neurology referral, everything was initially denied.”

She was eventually diagnosed with bilateral optic neuritis after fighting for the MRI, which she received early Sunday afternoon. The condition occurs when an optic nerve is inflamed and swollen. It is common among people with multiple sclerosis — a new concern.

“That possibility is terrifying, but what’s more frightening is how easily it could have been missed altogether,” she said, adding she needs further tests to determine what caused the vision loss, which hasn’t fully returned. “I shouldn’t have had to beg for the care I ultimately needed.”

Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara blamed the previous Progressive Conservative government in an email statement, saying front-line staff are doing their best to keep up.

“Health-care workers want the best for their patients, so it can be upsetting when they, themselves, don’t get the quality of care they expect,” said Asagwara, a former psychiatric nurse.

“We’ve made progress, with more than 1,600 net new folks working in our system and increasing access to diagnostics, but we have to keep going so that everyone, no matter who you are, gets the best health outcomes.”

Darlene Jackson, president of the Manitoba Nurses’ Union, said navigating the health-care system is difficult.

“I could not even imagine someone, a newcomer to our country, someone who has no knowledge at all of the health-care system, actually being able to do this themselves,” said Jackson.

She said the problem is made worse by high nurse-to-patient ratios — an issue that brought hundreds of nurses to the steps of the Manitoba legislature earlier this week — making it nearly impossible for them to properly advocate for patients.

“As nurses, we say to patients, if you have any changes in your condition, you need to call me, ring your bell,” Jackson said, adding they don’t have time to check regularly with bloated patient loads.

“Which is absolutely shameful, because we know as nurses what we should be doing, and I tell you nurses are suffering with compassion and exhaustion. There is just not the time for that compassion. And that’s what we’re best at.”

The nurse who is speaking out said she’s not looking to assign blame, something she made clear in her report to patient services at HSC, which the Free Press reviewed.

Instead, she is calling for change.

“I’m asking for reflection, solidarity, and actions from those of us who know the system best,” she said. “Because if this could happen to me, a nurse with nearly a decade of experience, someone who knows the system, speaks the language, and had family by my side, what happens to the person who doesn’t?

“What happens to the patient who sits quietly, doesn’t know what questions to ask, or gives up after being turned away just once? How many patients are judged that they are ‘faking it’? How many stories like mine are never heard, not because the person got better, but because they were ignored, dismissed, or never got the chance to speak up?

“I survived this not because the system worked, but because I refused to be silent.”

She said HSC has taken the complaint seriously.

“It is important to the WRHA that the people we serve have a voice in their care,” a WRHA spokesperson wrote in an email statement, noting patients are encouraged to ask questions and participate in their care.

scott.billeck@freepress.mb.ca