click socks–Can You Get Sick From Germs on Hospital Floors? “Non-slip socks are intended to be used for only short periods of time and are single-use medical devices. However, patients in the hospital tend to wear them around the clock and walk around the hospital with them, visiting toilets, coffee shops, gift shops, common areas, and so forth. People often wear the same socks for several days straight and take them to bed, too. In a 2016 short report published in the Journal of Hospital Infection, Mahida and Boswell found VRE on 85 percent of socks and MRSA on nine percent. Furthermore, VRE was found on 69 percent of hospital floors tested, and MRSA was found on 17 percent of floors tested. Of note, the power of this study was low and sample sizes were small. The researchers conclude that non-slip socks, which are usually in contact with hospital floors, are a potential nidus of infection. The authors suggest that these socks should be discarded after use and not be worn for extended periods of time. Exactly how long these socks can be donned, however, is unclear, and more research needs to be done.”

Reason:  they are full of dangerous germs you don’t want to bring home. I believed her and trashed lots of them during my recent hospital stays.

I spent a week in the hospital post colon rectal surgery and another week return trip to deal with horrible complications.  Home at last, I now have lovely visiting nurses, hubby and son, keeping me sane.  Three weeks prior to the surgery, I learned that diverticulitis disease had severely scarred my sigmoid colon  and that it would have to be removed.  And, then a temporary ileoscomy would be constructed until my innards had healed and my plumbing could be hooked up again. That means another big surgery in a few months.

Pretty drastic news but I was convinced that it was either cope with the new reality and surgery or put my affairs in order because sepsis would be a likely outcome. The odd thing is that I have only had two flare-ups of abdominal pain–the last one being horrendous–in the last two years or in my entire life.  And it took about 4 months to get anyone to take tummy problems seriously enough to investigate. I had to create some drama to get help.

This is not a good time to need surgery or pain meds.  With the opiate crisis raging, and doctors under fire, good luck getting enough pain relief to heal, rest or walk to the bathroom. Tylenol however is dispensed with a cheery smile.  I am haunted daily by the screams of a poor confused elderly woman enduring a painful procedure forced on her, against her wishes, without sedation first. (I reported it to the charge nurse.)

Why are pain medications being denied to patients who need it?  Why are drug addicts’ problems even part of  decision making?  State governments have helped to create this situation by not establishing methadone and harm reduction clinics to treat addicts and work with them over time.  Politics over science and common sense = lousy public health policies. And the media- tabloid’s influence can’t be denied as a driver of this hysteria.