User-friendly? Not!
It’s curious to me how February has transformed itself from the exciting birthday month of my childhood into days and days of doctoring. Somehow, every medical/dental appointment of the year has landed on my February calendar – the annual check-ups, the semi-annual check-ups, the referrals to new specialists, the follow-ups, the consultations. All in this twenty-eight or twenty-nine day period.
Yesterday it was a trip into Portland for my once-a-year visit to Oregon Health Sciences University. Not only does that highly respected institution have the least memorable name in the world (OHSU? OSHU? What???) but it is the least user-friendly of any medical facility ever. So many buildings. So many corridors. Elevators that only go to some of the floors. Doctors that are in this pavilion today, that pavilion tomorrow.
And god forbid you should need to call them ahead of time or between visits! I was standing at the nurse’s station in our own friendly little Ocean Beach Hospital a few years back, and a doctor was standing there with a telephone to his ear, obviously on hold. Minutes went by and he remarked to one of the nurses, “At least when you are waiting for someone at OHSU, there’s good classical music to listen to.” Yep. Been there!
Predictably, we got lost and, also predictably there was no one at the Information Desk. Minutes ticked by and we finally forged ahead anyway and asked the first person with a big OHSU Personnel Nametag for directions. She was very accommodating, but five walking minutes later, we were more lost than ever. And so it went.
By the time I found my doctor, I felt like I had been following the yellow brick road forever. And, like the Wizard of Oz, she really didn’t have any definitive answers for me. “Our best guess is…” Where were my ruby slippers? Where was Glinda the Good Witch? Where the hell was the exit?
I have five more pesky appointments this month in various places – Ilwaco, Astoria, Longview and Vancouver. Thank goodness none in Oz. Once a year is more than plenty!
Well, I hope you treated yourself to something fun while you were there such as a trip to Powell’s!