Editor:
On March 9 just before midnight I woke up to hear my husband falling down in another room.
I opened the door to find him on the floor with blood coming out of his head and mouth. Even the walls and the carpet were covered with blood.
He hit his head on a corner of a wooden door.
I grabbed a towel and applied pressure, then I called 911 for an ambulance.
While we waited for the paramedics I was still applying pressure and I had to change the towel because it was full of blood.
I looked at his head wound and I can tell to the best of my knowledge that he probably needed three to four stitches to close the flap of skin.
He was still bleeding so I reapplied a fresh towel and more pressure.
It was approximately 12:30 a.m. and we are still waiting for an ambulance so I called 911 again.
The dispatcher said: “They must be busy, the ambulance should be there shortly.”
There was still no ambulance at approximately 12:45 p.m. so I called a third time.
The dispatcher said “I’m sorry the paramedics must still be busy, they will get there as soon as they can”
I am just so livid by now. I said to cancel the call and I will handle this myself.
I was finally able to stop the bleeding from his head but then I had to get him off the floor.
You see my husband is a bigger man and I had great difficulty getting him off the floor without any kind of help.
My shoulder is injured so I was of no use to him.
Little did I know until we worked together to help him up, that his foot was also injured and he couldn’t apply pressure on his foot.
He finally got up off the floor around 1:35 a.m. but we didn’t get to the hospital that night.
Needless to say, we need more paramedics. We have never had any problems in the past with the ambulance service.
I have called for an ambulance so many times in the past for my husband, the paramedics and even some of the firefighters know him by his name and they know his history.
I had to call my son who’s a paramedic in Victoria to get medical advice from him.
Not fair. He couldn’t believe that the ambulance didn’t show up.
Not even a secondary person that has first aid such as a firefighter, police officer or even search and rescue couldn’t come to our aid?
A week later we went to see our family doctor and he ordered X-rays for my husband’s foot.
Well it turns out that he sprained his ankle and he had pulled some ligaments on the top of his foot.
His head was scabbed and bruised, he also bit his lip when he fell causing a bloody mouth, but he is fine. The cause of his fall was because he had blacked out due to low blood pressure.
We are hard-working taxpayers who shouldn’t have to go through this kind of stress without the help of our health system.
Tamara Vitaliano
Williams Lake
