Children's Emergency Department at HCA Florida Brandon Hospital

"Do not visit this hospital! My three-year-old son fell from a slide at the park. He was screaming and crying every time I touched his arm. Because I’m new to the area and know to go to pediatric hospitals instead of adult ones for children visits, I went to this pediatric emergency room. It took next to nothing to have him seen which was great. The nurses were polite, and the rooms were clean. Unfortunately, that’s not enough, their doctors are ill-trained and/or lack any experience in diagnosing children emergencies. They accurately took x-rays of my son’s arm and gave him Tylenol for the pain. When the x-ray results came back, the doctors told us there was nothing wrong with my son’s arm and that we should take him home and wait 2-7 days to see his pediatrician. They gave me paperwork saying he had a contusion, which is just a fancy word for bruising and so I should just ice his arm throughout the next day. We were told verbally and in writing that he could go back to school the next day. When I got home my son continued to cry and yelp when I touched his arm, and he was clearly holding it as if it was limp. Overnight, my son could not sleep from the pain so his dad and I went online to see if we could determine what could be the issue. Within five minutes we both determined that he could have nursemaid’s elbow which is very common (1 in 4 children will experience this) in toddlers up to the age of 7. I called his pediatrician the next day and she saw us right away. As soon as she saw my son, without touching him, she diagnosed the issue. With a trained maneuver in her office, she put his elbow back into place. He gained use of his arm immediately. She was extremely surprised that a pediatric ER did not have anyone on staff to diagnose my son appropriately. She said this is so common, it’s the first thing to assume when a child holds their arm in the way that my son was holding it. She also said that if I had waited the seven days to bring him in to correct his condition, it could have become a more serious issue. All in all, as an attorney and not trained in the medical field at all, it’s concerning that claimed medical professionals are treating children for what can be more complex than nursemaid’s elbow, yet a quick google search helped me determine what was wrong with my son when they could not. I have told all my friends with kids in this community to go elsewhere!"

"I took my 2 year old son to the hospital because he had difficulty breathing complained about chest and stomach ache runny nose and fever. They took x-ray and breath treatments, told me they are sending his prescription to the pharmacy, collected the prescription today and its just inhalation solution no nebulizer. I was not told I needed to get a nebulizer, I assumed that the prescription was a complete prescription. I went back to the hospital only to get a prescription sent to bills pharmacy and have trouble getting it because it notcovered by my insurance at that particular store, then I asked if can be sent to where my insurance is covering , I was toldNo you have to buy it, they only send prescription locally."

"These people doesn’t know what they are doing. I don’t think anyone here comes with an experience to treat the patients with proper treatment. Even on the kids they are trying to train the nurses in real time instead of having experience nurses to treat the patients. I suggest not to bring your kids to this ER. No one comes in to check about beeps on the monitor. Doctors also not having any idea of what’s going on with the baby. This is the 1st time I do not see any much options to take my baby for better treatment."

"Had us in and out and treated our kids like little princesses! Would highly recommend and we’ll be back for care for our family, staff was 100% caring and wish I would have gotten all their names. I will say, I called the HCA nurse line and they advised me to go, so they do offer that benefit to the community ❤️"

"I brought my granddaughter to the peds ED. We called as we were on our way in because she was struggling to breathe. The Peds provider and respiratory therapist met us at the door and care began immediately. She needed X-ray, and I went with her. I was so impressed with how each step was explained to keep her from being nervous. The care could not have been more compassionate, the nurse even let us borrow her own personal pulse oximetry to avoid us from having to have our granddaughter admitted. We returned it later, but was astonished at how caring everyone was."