On July 18 Erin Vaught awoke coughing up a cup of blood. After instruction from her primary physician Vaught drove with her wife and child to the Ball Memorial Hospital emergency room in Indiana, where she thought she would be diagnosed and treated for whatever was causing her health problems. Unfortunately the only kind of treatment Vaught experienced was mistreatment.
It began when the nurse doing Vaught’s intake reported her as male despite identification which noted otherwise. Nurses continued to harasses her while commenting on Vaught’s use of a unisex bathroom. One nurse asked Vaught’s wife "So is it a he, a she, or a he-she?"
Then, after hours of waiting to see a doctor, Vaught asked the Nurse what was taking so long. The nurse told her that she could not see a doctor until her primary physician gave them orders, because they didn’t know how to treat someone with her "condition."
"I was confused," Vaught said. "I told them I didn’t know my condition, that’s why I was there. She said ‘No, the transvestite thing.’ She said I couldn’t see a doctor until I came back with test orders from my doctor in Indy."
Vaught left the hospital undiagnosed and holding back tears. Now, her requests are pretty simple. She would like an apology from the hospital and training on LGBTQI issues for all hospital staff, in order to insure other queer patients will never be subjected to similar harassment by the Ball hospital staff.
Leave a comment