Before I begin, I would like to point out, that I have (and still have) continuous health care coverage for as long as I can remember.
Late 2010, I had a severe asthma attack after playing football. Luckily my friend was still around and he called 911. The ambulance arrived about 3 minutes later and rushed me to the hospital. I fell unconscious in the ambulance, so I don't remember much while I continued to slip in and out of consciousness. I finally woke up early in the morning with a tube down my throat. I fell asleep again and woke up a few hours later with my wife in the room. Because I was still attached to the ventilator, I was unable to speak. Eventually the ventilator was removed when it was determined I could breathe on my own. After it was removed, one of the first things my wife told me was that the hospital tried to get her to consider signing a DNR (do not resuscitate) sheet on me, but obviously she refused or I probably wouldn't be writing this review. My only guess is that the reason they tried to push the DNR on her was because they THOUGHT I didn't have insurance. (I did BTW, and still do). Because I arrived to the hospital unconscious, there was no way I give them my information. But that didn't seem to matter; the quicker I die, the quicker they no longer have to waste their time or resources on me. The staff was nice at first, but as the days went by as I continued to recover they seemed to get more and more irritated, and seemed to want to force me out. The day of my discharge, a lady came by to discuss payment options and that's when I told her I did have insurance and I would give her the insurance card when my wife came by to pick me up. Ultimately, I had to physically walk down to the billing department to give them my insurance information which triggered another slight asthma attack, but the nursing staff didn't even care, they sent me home anyway but I eventually recovered on my own.
This hospital saved my life, but if they had their way and my wife signed the DNR, I'd be dead.
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