CHI Memorial Hospital - Chattanooga

"As a former staff member of memorial hospital, I suffered mental abuse from managerial staff, in particular, a nurse manager named Petra. She treated people working under her management like slaves and showed no human care for us whatsoever. I am now 57 and still have nightmares about the place."

"As an individual who has had many surgeries and hospitalizations at CHI Memorial, not only do they want to be the highest paid hospital in Tennessee, their standard of care has decreased exponentially. Their quality of employees is sub par, to say the least. As a recent patient, I experienced a situation that CHI Memorial in no way took accountability for, nor expressed any concern, empathy, compassion, responsibility or attempted to rectify in any way. I had surgery that resulted in complications, and necessitated an emergency admission that evening with another surgery scheduled the next morning. The CNA assigned to my room came in and her behavior was absolutely horrific. She verbally abused and threatened me, and slammed the bathroom door so violently that the entire room shook. This took place when I was in my hospital bed, hooked up to numerous lines and unable to defend myself. This CNA was rough, crude and unprofessional in appearance and language. I immediately called for the charge nurse, who was wonderful and apologized profusely. I was advised to file a Complaint Report with CHI Memorial’s Patient Safety Management upon discharge, which I did. I received a letter from the Patient Safety Management office that they were looking into the situation and provided a phone number and requested that I call as they “attempted to call three times but have not been able to reach you”. The letter stated “Please know that we take concerns about patient care and safety seriously”. I promptly called the phone number listed. What happened next is shocking. The woman I spoke with said “we’ve tried to call you three times and you haven’t answered your phone”. I replied that I could have been in a situation where I was unable to answer and I did not have any voicemails from CHI Memorial, and that if I had seen their number and was able, I would have answered the call. I also stated that I receive many “spam” calls and was not in the habit of answering numbers I did not recognize. As it turns out, the nursing leader had been calling from her personal cell phone those three times. The woman I was speaking with became rude, hostile and accusatory. She stated she had spoken with the employee and the employee responded with “I don’t cuss and that’s not my curve”, whatever that means. She was so condescending it was shocking. She took zero responsibility for the actions of this employee and actually defended her. She said they would call me again “from a CHI Memorial phone number”. To date, I have never received a follow up call or letter from anyone. The employee in question should never have been hired by CHI Memorial as a CNA, or in any capacity, due to her abysmal treatment of patients. If she behaved in this manner with me, I can only imagine others she has abused, but my main concern was her possible mistreatment of elderly or special needs patients who are at her mercy. I know everyone is experiencing staffing shortages, but they scraped the bottom of the barrel on this one."

"Took my father to the ER on 2/16/24 complaining of headache , dizziness and pain in the left side of his neck. Immediately they got him back and did EKG and CT scan , when the doctor came in he had my father explain to him what was going on. When my father was talking to the doctor the doctor rudely interrupted and told my father he didn't want to hear all that just when did his symptoms start. Again my father tried telling him again and the Dr said sir your story is all over the place !! The doctor then reviewed his scans and said he was having congestive heart failure but wanted to order more test. Did more test and another Dr. Came and she was very nice and listened to us. They ended up admitting my father and come to find out he had a minor stroke. I understand ER doctor gets stressed out, but you chose this profession and I guess you don't remember the Hippocratic Oathe..it's sad that we trust these professionals with our Healthcare and they make a person feel like we are a burden to them..by the way I do have a picture of that doctor!"

"All the people here are great. Everybody is the nicest people you can meet. My husband had a bypass and they have been wonderful with us."

"I broke my tibia and fibula and was rushed here where they immediately got me a room and attention. Within 24 hours I was out of surgery and and recovering. The nurses were so nice and patient with me through this and it’s an experience I will always appreciate. Doctor Lawson also had a really comforting and confident demeanor which helped me feel that I was going to get good care. I just had my follow up appointment in another state and the orthopedic doctor was super impressed by the work Doctor Lawson did."