Hillside Surprise

I sure did mean to get to this sooner. Ever since we brought Louie home I have been working at a break neck pace to catch up on bills and to take advantage of some very good deals. I promised to share our experience with Hillside Hospital with everyone as soon as I got the chance so here it is.

I have lived in this county for 30+ years and while I don't know any of the "important folks" and really don't care to, I do know some folks who are indeed important. I know this area real well too. From most every road to the hills and hollows in this county and a good deal about the surrounding counties and towns. For most of these years, as far as I ever knew, Hillside Hospital had a questionable reputation. I can't say just how well deserved or not deserved it was but I can tell you that Hillside Hospital has earned my respect in several ways. Small town hospitals catch a lot of grief as people tend to relate the number of patients leaving the little hospitals for the big town hospitals to received more specialized treatment with receiving better care. After everything that has happened this summer I have come to the conclusion that people generally don't even know what "care" is. Chalk that one up in my LONG list of words people regularly misuse and abuse. The funny thing is I don't give much of a rip about good language skills. I just can't stand to see very meaningful words getting tossed around carelessly. Words like Love, Hate, Judge, Race, God, Faith, Wealth, Poor, and the list goes on.....but now I add the word "Care". At Hillside my wife received care. It takes a good hospital, staff, and doctor to know when they have reached the end of the road in treating a patient and if and when a patient needs to move on to a facility with better tools or experience to better treat someone's illness. Before they sent Misty off to Nashville we got to know all the nurses by name and nearly all of them seemed to have a genuine concern for her. Not only that, but they also seemed to have intrinsic value tying their performance, the patient's well being, and the reputation of the hospital. It seemed as though when any one of those subjects were brought up, one or both of the others were talked about in the same conversation. I can go on for a while about this but I will leave it there.

Hats off to Hillside Hospital for a job well done. God Bless you guys and gals.


-Daniel