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The folks at Hospital B decided to send me a hospital known as an LTACH. That's Long Term Acute Care Hospital. Fortuitously there happened to be one across town - Hospital C.

BTW, there's not really any such thing as an LTACH. It's a grandiose term used by hospitals that operate under conditions of a federal law passed in 1999 to allow more revenue for long-term care hospitals that operate according to the terms of the law. The term 'acute' was not used and is actually ridiculous when you think about what these hospitals actually do. But it sounds impressive to some people and that's all that matters.

To this day I remember absolutely nothing about my experience at the first two hospitals. The type and quantities of drugs necessary to control my pain was such that apparently none of it was stored in my memory in any accessible place. Trauma induced memory loss is a possibility, or the drugs. Or both. Probably both. In any case exactly one month, to the degree that a month can be exact, I was transported from Hospital B to Hospital C.

What is an LTACH, besides the words above? In my opinion a cash cow for the Medical Industry. This subspecies of the Beast was created in 1999 by federal law. Since laws are written by the lobbyists who pay to elect members of Congress what could possibly not go wrong? For the benefit of the Medical Industry everything.

It would be another month or so before I became cognizant of my situation, and almost another before I escaped it. Or was rescued.

I probably have one or two bits of memory from before I awakened and stayed that way. I remember being in an ambulance, the ambulance being backed into the unloading bay at a hospital and being rolled through the halls of the hospital, and then everything went black again. On another occasion I was being visited by a friend and we watched television for an hour or so. I know that was real only because she told me about it later. Almost everything else for that month or so was drug-induced hallucinations.

Hallucinations induced by a cocktail of psychopharmaceuticals administered by a doctor whose incompetence is difficult to envision. In fact I suspect that while incompetence was a factor, the fact that this was a hospital designed to extract as much money as possible from patients before they either die or somehow manage to leave had something to do with it.

After I was free, actually it was more than a year before I was able - mentally and physically - to examine the records and see what that clown had done to me.

What are psychopharmaceuticals? Drugs to alter by chemical means the behavior of the person they are administered to. What behavior was the good doctor attempting to modify? Well, I was there to be treated for the kidney injury, which required dialysis until the problem was resolved. I am not aware of any psychotropic medications to treat kidney damage. I don't believe the doctor is either.


What is all that stuff? That stuff is what was being put into me every day for more than two months. Here's a list for you to Google.





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