I tried to tell the staff at the clinic at the Pine Street Inn that a woman was passing out over and over and almost falling out of her chair. I was told "I'll tell the nurse."
I think that it was by accident that, at least 20 minutes later, a nurse was in the lobby and about to knock on the door of the main office, when I asked him to speak to the woman who was passing out. He checked that she was breathing and that she could be woken up, and said that he would check on her again, which hasn't happened so far.
My lottery number was called for a bed, and the shelter has changed its policy so that you have to go upstairs to the dorms and shower as soon as your number is called. I can't continue to sit with her to make sure that she's breathing or that she doesn't fall over, or that she knows if her number gets called for a bed.
I went to the nurses' station again, and was told by the receptionist, "You need to tell the shelter." "The shelter" already knows, because I told one of the regular shelter staff, who also works as a supervisor some of the time, that the woman was passing out, before I went to the nurses' station the first time.
Copyright L. Kochman, October 2, 2015 @ 6:58 p.m.
