A British Columbia kidney patient who had to be airlifted to a Kelowna hospital for treatment was stuck sleeping in the hospital鈥檚 hallway for five days because all the rooms were full.
Shawn Ponte was airlifted from Cranbrook, B.C. to Kelowna General Hospital last week. Five days later, he was still sleeping in a bed in a hallway.
Instead of getting angry, Ponte decided to post videos to Facebook to make his point.
In one video, he records the din of hospital machines just a few feet from his bed. 鈥淚t鈥檚 making me go bonkers,鈥� he says in a video he called 鈥淚鈥檓 going nuts at Kelowna General Hospital鈥� on Facebook.
I'm going nuts at Kelowna general hospital
Posted by on Monday, January 2, 2017
Ponte said he went public with his concerns not just for himself but for others who need care.
鈥淚f they were so full, and didn鈥檛 have the room to begin with, why didn鈥檛 they tell the Cranbrook hospital and they could have sent me to a different hospital that could have taken care of me properly,鈥� Ponte said in an interview with CTV Vancouver.
鈥淚t鈥檚 probably happened before to other people and they just haven鈥檛 had the means to get it out there and I finally stood up for myself and said, 鈥楬ey, enough is enough.鈥欌��
Kelowna General Hospital鈥檚 administration is calling the situation 鈥渦nfortunate鈥� and says Ponte鈥檚 five-day hallway stint will be the subject of a review.
鈥淲e try to minimize that as much as possible, and it is quite rare to have that length of time however it shows the increased acuity and the demand of hospital care right now,鈥� Andrew Hughes, the hospital鈥檚 head of medical services, told CTV News.
After five days, Ponte was moved into a room and said Wednesday that was looking forward to getting his operation over with so that he can go back home.
With a report by CTV Vancouver鈥檚 Kent Molgat
