My Review (on yelp.com) of Seton NW Hospital in Austin TX

After reading RAVE reviews about this hospital, I feel compelled to write this, my first ever, review. If only my hands would quit shaking. My dear husband, who remains my greatest earthly blessing, may lose his life because of unbelievably poor treatment he experienced. After numerous trips to the ER (more than 5) with the chief complaint of pain in his chest (not throat) while swallowing, a CT-scan showed a tumor in his chest the size of my fist. This tumor was completely encircling the outside of his esophagus, squeezing it almost entirely shut, and crushing his windpipe into the back of his breastbone. He was told he needed his "throat scoped" right away. After explaining he had no health insurance coverage and no primary care physician (PCP), Patrick was told by the doctor to come back in a week if he was unable to get this test done, as the size and placement made this a life-threatening condition. We spent the next week calling every clinic and doctor we could, getting no help. We live in a part of Austin that is in Williamson County, so we called the medically indigent program, and were told it would take 5 weeks to be assigned to and get a PCP, who would then make a referral to a GI specialist. We went back to Seton NW, and this time we told the ER doctor my husband needed his throat scoped and that we could not get the test done anywhere else. The doctor replied, "Having a tumor in your chest is NOT an emergency. We diagnose breast and other cancers all the time and send folks home." He went on to further tell us as soon as they could bring down his elevated blood pressure, he would be sent home. It seems that hearing the cold and uncaring statements from this ER doctor had a lot to do with my husband's blood pressure not stabilizing, because they decided to admit him. Upon learning we had come to the ER this visit because my husband needed an endoscopy of his esophagus, the admitting physician (not the ER doctor) called a GI doctor and arranged for the endoscopy to be done the next day. The test showed malignant cancer. The GI doctor giving us the bad news was visibly shaken, explaining my husband should have been diagnosed a year earlier, during any one of his many visits to the ER with the same symptoms, when the cancer was still the size of a pinto bean and CURABLE! Now, more than six months after the diagnosis, my husband has undergone and completed radiation therapy and chemotherapy. He almost died twice during chemo, which had to be administered around the clock, in the hospital for 5 days at a time, every third week for three and a half months. We did not go to Seton NW for these hospitalizations. I can barely drive by the place without bursting into tears. Now, my husband faces an Esophagogastrectomy, which removes the tumor and his entire esophagus below the tumor, even though below the tumor towards his stomach is disease free. He will lose his stomach, too. They have to harvest his stomach to attach it to the bottom of what is left of his esophagus, for it to serve as an esophagus. His stomach will no longer function as a stomach, dumping food, mostly undigested, directly into his small intestine. After this surgery to remove the tumor, he will never again be able to eat and digest food normally. But, never mind that his "quality of Life" will be drastically reduced, the statistics show WITH the surgery he only has a 50-percent chance of reaching a 5-year survival mark. His surgery was scheduled to happen 6 weeks ago. Exactly when the surgeon picked up the scalpel, my husband had a case of PROFOUND anaphylactic shock from one of the drugs he was given and his face swelled up like a basketball and his BP dropped to 45/20. The surgeon called off the operation telling us that maybe the accident in the OR was "a sign" for my husband to rethink having the surgery to remove the tumor. He went on to say that not always, but most of the time, after the surgery the pathology on the tumor comes back negative for active cancer. Which means the radiation and chemo- therapies did what they were supposed to do and killed all the cancer in the tumor. The surgeon and the oncologist both checked and cannot find any statistics on cases where the patient did not have the tumor surgically removed. We do not know what to do next. It is hard for me to cope knowing my husband did not receive a timely diagnosis just because he did not have health insurance coverage. Yes, I have proof of this, and no, I cannot sue them. It seems doctors have a hard time testifying in court because they might lose their "practicing privileges" at the hospital where my husband failed to get the care he deserved. It is not about retribution anyway. Just know: each time he went to the ER his complaint was the same and we were truthful about having no doctor or health insurance.