I took someone to the Emergency department of Khoo Teck Puat Hospital on Friday, 25 November 2011. We arrived at a little after 1 p.m. and after much waiting for consultation, injections, x-rays and consultation again, we were more or less done by about 5:30 p.m. The doctor advised that the patient should be warded for at least one night for observation.
I do not know if the doctor noticed that her own hospital staff had put up a huge sign in the Emergency department itself, sometime in the morning, before we arrived. Yup, it’s the picture above, with the words “Our wards are full.”
Since the patient was independent enough to wait for a bed himself, I left at about six. At 8:30 p.m. he phoned me, saying the nurse had just told him there was no likelihood of a bed freeing up tonight. They were going to send him to another hospital. He decided to discharge himself instead.