CHA Everett Hospital 103 Garland Street, Everett, MA 02149

"My elderly and disabled mother was transported by ambulance to the CHA Everett emergency department a couple of days ago for a complication regarding her urinary catheter. It was a horrendous experience. She was never seen by a doctor, and it was only after a I had to make a scene at the nurses' station at the nearly 4 hour wait mark that I was able to facilitate a physician assistant, Ms. Chen, to come into my mother's room to finally dialogue with us. When she did so, because of the underlying tension, I ended up getting into a heated verbal argument with her and the attending nurse, who, while initially attentive, disappeared for nearly three hours without communicating with us regarding the reason for the delay in Ms. Chen's intervention. Making matters worse, when a patient or his or family member advocates for themselves when they justifiably feel they have reason to do so relative to the quality of care they are receiving, the CHA ED staff essentially become very defensive and intimidating, which only serves to escalate the situation. Further, it was readily and disturbingly apparent, at least during this most recent visit, that a solitary, overwhelmed physician assistant, rather than an MD, was running the show, which is very concerning, obviously, and when this was pointed out to the staff by me, they didn't respond too kindly, to say the least, however true my operational observations were relative to best practices standards. (Note to CHA management, rather than tell me to respond by filling out an online form, please have a patient relations representative respond to my numerous voicemails asking for a phone call response to my home phone number.)"

"Terribly understaffed, most nursing and counselors are kind and decent (would give them a 3 star rating independently), but most doctors here are hopped up on trying to heavily medicate every patient to a point beyond what is medically necessary and it is detrimental to their health and human rights as living and breathing individuals (1 star). Overall average rating of 1.5, rounded up to 2 for simplicity."

"My mother had an appointment scheduled with Dr DATTA in neurology and this appointment took months to get. My mother had a fall this morning and took some time to get ready and although she wanted to stay home and rest, I told her this appointment was important and took time to book so we couldn’t miss it. We managed to make it to the garage at 9:58am despite the road work being done and the appointment was for 10 am. We drove an hour to get there because of the distance. We found parking on the last level (4th floor). Because my mom has poor balance and struggles getting around, it took her time to get down the stairs to then walk into the building. (The elevator was on the opposite end of where we parked). I was hoping a wheelchair was nearby for those who need it. We got to the visit 15 minutes late. While waiting Dr DATTA came out to tell his staff he couldn’t see her because she was late. I spoke to the nurse/staff person and explained how hard it was to even make the appointment today and that it wasn’t fair because he could still see us even if it’s not the full 45 minutes. She went to speak with him. He then came out to tell me that we are late and he doesn’t want to do a quick visit. I explained that we’ve waited months for this appointment and given her condition and the fall this morning we did our best to get here as quickly as we could. He said we’d have to reschedule or wait until this afternoon when he sees his final patient. At least give us the option to have a quick visit for the 25-30 minutes left instead of telling us to reschedule. Also, his office received her recent hospitalization records with the CT scan, EEG and the MRI she just had. You mean to tell me you didn’t review the records prior to the appointment to be able to at least talk to us for 25-30? If we are ok with a shorter visit then what’s the problem? Also, when we go to appointments through CHA the wait times can be ridiculous, but we know visits can run late and things can happen. I never want to deal with him again. We’ll look for another neurologist through another practice."

"I never complain I rarely do. I've done a lot of that in my life and always seek alternatives and what not or just cope and move on. NOT SURE what's going on here.. 4 hours in the emergency room for a potentially fractured foot, all my ligaments are sprained or torn and no one ended up calling my name. The ER ran out of seats and there was no staff to attend to anyone or even people being seen for serious inquiries. Not sure if this is a staff shortage or incompetence or both OR society is changing right under our noses and anyone who isn't on the higher tax brackets are officially unimportant . Something happened for sure that is a malfeasance against our communities. What's going on?????"