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Going into Labor in the Emergency Room

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meg_evonne:
Here's what Lindsay sent. Hope that it helps.

Sorry it's taken me so long to reply but I wanted to answer on my regular computer which I'm not on very much. The answers to these questions will vary depending on if it is a larger hospital like methodist or the university of iowa or if it is a small town hospital that doesn't do a lot of deliveries. At Methodist, pretty much as soon as a pregnant woman walks in to the ER, she is sent upstairs to labor and delivery with someone from the ER escorting her. Once she is on our unit, she is taken to a triage room. If she looks uncomfortable at all, we hook her up to the monitors quickly and assess her but even if she's not uncomfortable, she is seen fairly quickly. The paper work waits until she is more comfortable or delivers or if there is someone with her, they will fill out the paper work if there is time. On the off chance that she waited too long to get to the hospital and is unable to be transported even by bed to our unit, our doctor and nurse will run down to the ER and deliver her there but this is extremely rare. Let me know if you need more specific information.

Lindsay

Quantus:
My sister-in-law is currently having contractions on the first of the new generation of our family, so I might have more relevant info to share tomorrow :-D

Fyrchick:
Hmm... adding to Meg/Lindsay said, I can add a slightly different option.

Thinking about the largest L&D/Children's hospital in my area, the BEST way to bypass normal ER admitting and security procedure is to come by EMS. (I've had 3 pre-term patients in the last 9 months-all went DIRECTLY to the floor and admitting met them there, rather than stop in the ER.) In the case of pre-term or imminent labor or delivery, the EMS crew will (ok, SHOULD) do a complete report before getting to the ED. Depending on the situation a team will meet them in the ED or we will go right to the floor. (Most ER staff is like, "Baby? Pregnant? Get the hell out of here and to L&D!!! Quick! Go!")  The trick is to have something that gets you to the floor but not under the immediate attention of the staff etc. Pregnant people in labor get A LOT of attention.
So my first suggestion would be for your protagonist to pose as an EMS crew, not the patient. They are there all day, and the private transport crews take people OUT or to and from appointments all day, from all over the hospital. That is normal and rarely questioned. You can have someone on the stretcher or not. You can have them go to the victim's room, pretend they are they to transport or whatever... then the staff will have to go check etc etc. You might even be able to check the chart that way since EMS has to do a run report with basic medical info anyway, so they usually have to see the chart... again, wouldn't normally be questioned.

Another option is the "getting lost" approach. Go in as EMS, pretend you are there to pick someone up, OR are from out of town and dropped someone off and got lost getting out. Happens all the time in the big places.
(The same applies to wheelchair van transport.)

Depending on how accurate you want it, PM me and I can answer questions if you want.  8)

Snowleopard:
Hmmm, how about smaller hospital - one protagonist poses as EM and the other as a pregnant woman.  He can come in, give name of doctor that he's seen on a chart, and head "her" up to L and D.  You still maintain the humor of the 'pregnancy'.

David one Mutts Friend:
I know when  I was working Emergency room back in the 80's when ever we had a delivery come in either by POV or ambulance, the standard question was how far apart are the contractions? Any thing over a minute they were rushed up to L and D. Under a minute a L and D nurse was dispatched down to the ER with a O2 warmer/bassinet as to transport said delivery to the nursery.
But we had a lady who every year came in and delivered in the ER lobby, three years running last year was a pool on it, got to be close to 200 dollars. Sadly I did not win it.

David

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