All It Cost Me Was a Chunk of Lung

When I went in for my lung biopsy, I didn’t really know what to expect. I knew there would be three incisions in my side for the little robot arms. They’d take some lung, and on their way out, would sew things up subcutaneously. There would be a chest tube to make sure no air was leaking out, and when the chest tube came out, I could go home.

The first surprise came when I was being prepped for surgery. Instead of the usual hospital blanket on the bed, there was an air blanket. It looks like an air mattress made out of paper. There’s a hole at the bottom for a tube to blow in warm air. Amazing! Toasty warm, but no pressure. Loved it!

Everything went well and after being in recovery for a while I was put in a room. It was the smallest room I’ve ever seen. No closet because there was no room for one. My roomie was a cardiac patient who had been moved from ICU to recover in a regular room. The next surprise was when the nurse explained that I was on the cardiac floor, which meant I was going to get a cardiac diet, even though I was NOT a cardiac patient. BUT I WAS PREPARED!!! I’ve gotten cardiac food before…YUK! No salt! This time I brought my own shaker of salt…

The next surprise was the food. Other than having no salt (which was easily rectified) IT WAS DELICIOUS!! It was the usual type meals, but they were good! After I added the salt. And I have never had such wonderful gelatin and sorbet in my life!! This wasn’t the cube of green Jello in a dish, or plastic cup of ice cream. It was GREAT! I didn’t get any coffee, but that was OK because the hospital had an awesome cafeteria with a little coffee set-up on one side and Marv got me a wonderful mocha latte.

All in all, this was probably the most positive hospital experience I’ve ever had. They were ON. THE. SPOT. when it came to pain meds. No hassling, no begging, very attentive. Once I got home and the hospital meds wore off, I did have quite a bit of pain, but I managed with the meds I had on hand.

Now for the title. I had met all my deductions with my many hospital stays at the beginning of the year, so there was no real out of pocket cost for the UC Davis Medical stay. Otherwise, it would have been something like $135,000.00! For one night’s stay. And a couple of meals. I guess the robots demanded high pay…

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