Glenn Beck Blasts Hospital That Treated Him - UPDATED

I found a seven minute video clip that Glenn Beck made after getting home from surgery on Friday.

He stated that his surgery went “horribly awry” and that he “almost” died. He praised the physicians and nurses as being “incredible,” but bashed the hospital as being “phenomenally bad.” He has stories to “melt the brain” and hopes that his stories “melt the brain of the CEO.” Because this hospital treats the president of GE, and because Glenn Beck alleges that he was nearly killed, he now asserts that he knows how all the average “schlubbs” are treated in the US healthcare system. At one point, he stated that some things that happened to him “could have come out of the movie ‘Saw.’”

He learned the meaning of compassion and thinks that he can now define it. He believes that most people don’t understand compassion, but now he has some real examples of compassion, what it means, and how to apply it.

Stated that he was in a drug-induced state that drove him to the point of being “full-fledged suicidal” in which he would have “blown his brains out” with a handgun. Within 3 days, he said that he went from a feeling of great success to feeling that there was “absolutely no reason to live.”

I think Glenn Beck has his moments. Not a huge fan, but like hearing what he has to say. He overdramatizes some things at times, but I’m guilty of that myself. He also thinks outside the box more than most people and I like that a lot about him. He has the insight to see the big picture. I just hope that he’s not going to whine because he wasn’t treated like as much of a VIP as the president of GE.

His video kept saying that he “can’t wait to tell us about it.” Supposedly more is coming out in his TV and radio broadcasts tomorrow.

I can’t wait to hear about it.

Hat tip to Mediabistro.com and its TVNewser service.

UPDATE JANUARY 10, 2008
Due to working long hours, I’m a little late to the public flogging on this subject, but I had to throw in my two cents. I enjoyed reading the comments made by Kevin, MD and his readers. One post stated that Glenn’s surgery was for … hemorrhoids.

After reading Glenn’s post about the incident, I was a little disappointed. No, I was very disappointed. To me, this came across as a media stunt. He’s not someone who needs that big of a rating’s boost. The people who watched his show to hear more about “things from the movie ‘Saw’” were most likely disappointed and my guess is that he lost more in negative press than he gained in viewership.

His first theme seemed to be pain control. Hemorrhoids are painful, sure. If your “amazing” doctors didn’t prep you by telling you that this is a very painful surgery, then they aren’t quite as amazing as you think. So the pain is there. First question I have is why is someone on morphine, fentanyl, and Percocet for pain control after hemorrhoid surgery? What does being “stabilized” in pain after surgery mean? Being pain-free? I don’t think so. And if you have the unrealistic expectation of being pain-free every minute after surgery, you are setting yourself up for an overdose. If you’re taking several narcotics plus another pain medication that “starts with an ‘N’” then of course you’re going to be “screwed up.” This wasn’t the hospital’s fault, this was the fault of the physician (or physicians) who prescribed you all of these medications.

Glenn digresses for a second to tell everyone how after his story hit the Drudge Report, the hospital president called Glenn “all freaked out.” Glenn writes that the hospital president “doesn’t get it” whatever “it” is. Let’s put this in perspective. If the head of CNN read on the Drudge Report that Glenn Beck had performed some heinous act and that Martha Stewart was going to take it public, don’t you think the head of CNN would call Martha Stewart “all freaked out” to find out what the problem was? Did you ever think of speaking to a hospital administrator before dropping this bomb on them? Doubt it. Glenn, you’ve been given a tremendous gift that Teddy Roosevelt called the “bully pulpit” and you’ve misused it. You’ve advanced your own agenda like Ellen DeGeneres advanced some agenda against a dog shelter. The hospital president had a right to be “freaked out” and I’ll tell you why, but, as you put it in your rambling website post, you have to “wait for the end of the story” (and by the way, you never did tell anyone what “it” was or why the hospital president “didn’t get it”)

Glenn states that his doctors “called ahead” to make sure that the emergency department was waiting for him when he arrived. If his doctors really did that, they were idiots. Things don’t work that way in an emergency department. It’s not a restaurant.

“Sorry ma’am, I know you’re having acute myocardial ischemia, but this room is reserved for Glenn Beck - you know, THE Glenn Beck. Yeah, him. You’ll just have to wait until the staff is all done with him.” Not happening.

You don’t get appointments in the ED. You get seen by severity of illness. If someone is shot in the chest or having a stroke, you better believe that someone with hemorrhoid pain and a full bladder is going to sit in the waiting room. Imagine the inverse: “Glenn Beck dies of heart attack while doctors insert Foley catheter into poor little old lady who couldn’t pee.”

If the surgeons were really “the best team of doctors you could imagine,” they would have met you at the hospital or met you at their office. Instead, they dump you on the ED. Great guys.

The ED staff was less than compassionate with you. Granted. For someone who isn’t exactly known for his compassion, I was surprised at how personally you took the actions of the medical staff. I’m not condoning what they did, but it would be nice to have the staff’s side of the story. By now they have probably been fired to quell the storm you have created.

Then you sat in the ER with your bladder “extended” for two hours. Here’s the next question I have: Why did your “amazing” doctors send you home with a distended bladder? You didn’t make that whole 1500 cc of urine in 2-4 hours. If your doctors were really so great, they should have known that one of the side effects of narcotics is urinary retention. Wonder what the side effects of four different narcotics would be (besides respiratory depression). Perhaps more urinary retention? Didn’t they make you urinate before you left? There are a lot of things I am questioning right about now and not many of them have to do with the hospital.

Then you get to the floor and what do your doctors prescribe you? More narcotics. More respiratory depression. More urinary retention. I’m not sure why it took you five days to get off the pain medication, but nothing you said seemed like anything from the movie “Saw.”

So, Glenn, I’m disappointed for a lot of reasons. I thought you had more insight than you apparently do. Perhaps you and your wife weren’t treated with common decency when you were in need. That needs to be addressed with the administration of the hospital, not with the national media.
Then you failed to address the big picture. Why is this happening to you and the average “schlubb” as you put it? You didn’t address how the system is crumbling before our eyes. More ED visits, less EDs, no reimbursement, whacked out malpractice atmosphere, disjointed care, patient dumping, long waits for care. The list goes on and on. Why don’t you talk to the American College of Emergency Physicians about this?
You had the opportunity to bring these issues to the forefront. Instead you wrote some rambling mishmash of self-pity and suicidal ideations because you couldn’t cope with the pain of hemorrhoid surgery. You did nothing to change the situation, although I’m sure some people were fired because they weren’t nice to THE Glenn Beck. Now I see where your comments about the president of GE come in.

Rather than turn your story into a cogent discussion of how to improve the healthcare system, you turned your story into the latest YouTube craze and a ratings stunt. Congratulations.

At least CNN still has Robin Meade.