An elderly gentleman, I'd say about 85 years old, had been admitted, his wife by him. I overheard the E.R. nurse's conversation with him, and overheard that he was diabetic, his current blood glucose being measured at 8.5 mmol/L (153 mg/dL), rather high.
Since the wait was long, he was offered a supper. It came on a tray, with a large strip of paper on it labeled "diabetic".
The supper consisted of:
- Vegetable soup
- a package of two soda crackers
- egg salad sandwich on white bread
- three raw baby carrots
- fruit salad cup
- 4 oz. "cranberry cocktail"
The man had half the soup, left the carrots, and finished the sandwich, fruit and drink. The hospital is giving crackers, white bread, fruit and sugar water to an elderly diabetic! I was pretty well horrified. I asked the wife casually if she didn't think it was odd that they feed sugar-water to a diabetic (12 grams of sugar in the cranberry drink). Her reply was, "I'm sure they know what they're doing."
