Texas Children's Hospital - West Tower — Local services in Houston

I took my oldest son who is nine years old to the emergency room here a few months ago. I was trying to have him committed because he is very destructive to property, makes threats, hurts others, hits himself, and refuses to learn. He has literally destroyed most of the inside of our house with his behaviors and almost every wall surface is damaged or defaced. He showed a lot of behaviors that were cause for great concern prior to taking him here. I told the emergency room staff and tried to get him psychiatric treatment but because he did not show the behaviors in the E.R. they did not see emergent reason to have him treated. My son acted normal and behaved well because he wanted to avoid being admitted inpatient and having to live in the psychiatric unit for an extended period of time. We waited sixteen hours to finally get him transferred and during that time they did not do any neurological exam or brain scan and the same questions were asked by about a dozen different people. I told them he most likely has brain damage as a result of his dead mother because his reasoning appears to be very poor. He is malicious, a compulsive liar, and an expert manipulator. Despite me telling them all of these things, they still did not doing any meaningful testing other than blood work. My other son was also with us. After sixteen hours I became very upset and demanded they let us take him elsewhere because we were exhausted and they were not giving him any services. He was transferred via ambulance to West Oaks Hospital which was extremely cold in the admitting area. We had to explain everything to them again after another wait amounting to about two hours. The bathrooms at West Oaks Hospital were filthy with toilet paper in paper bags covered in poop, urine on the floor, and poop smeared on the floor, toilet, and walls. While at West Oaks Hospital over half of his twenty-six brand new articles of clothing were stolen and he was discharged after eleven days with less than a two week supply of medications he had never taken before. They diagnosed him with bipolar disorder, ADHD, sleep difficulty, and autism. They discharged my son wearing someone else’s clothing. Staff members there told me West Oaks Hospital is basically a day care. When I read the reviews about the facility Texas Children’s Hospital sent my son to for inpatient evaluation I realized it was a miracle he had left West Oaks Hospital alive at all. My son reported being bullied heavily while there by the other children. He was moved from the original unit he was in to another unit but they did not provide an explanation as to why this was done. I provided them with a Texana report, behavioral records from two schools, and my own personal logs about my son. West Oaks said they would look at the records if they could find them and if they had time - this was their psychologist that told me this who was responsible for evaluating him before he could come home. They never followed up on the paperwork I told them to review concerning his behavior logs and disciplinary reports. It was about one-hundred pages of detailed reports. When he returned home he behaved worse than when he was admitted to West Oaks Hospital. Now he sleep walks and he talks in his sleep almost every night. He gets angry in his sleep at his brother. He hates his brother because he does not want anyone else near me and does not want to share the attention his bad behavior gets him. He is not stupid. He knows what he is doing is wrong. I am strongly considering sending him to live in a state hospital for at least a year for extended evaluation, possibly even longer. Overall, while I am sure Texas Children’s Hospital Downtown has provided good care to other people they really failed here. They need to provide a better standard of care to pediatric psychiatric patients and show some compassion to their families. It took me an entire day after the ordeal we went through trying to get him services for me to recover due to severe exhaustion. Fix your...

I couldn't be more pleased. My baby boy had a very pleasant experience beginning to end. July 5th my son was scheduled for Urologic Surgery an I tell you it seemed as if EVERTHING other then the kitchen sink was being thrown at me. From my car battery dead ( NEEDED A JUMP), medical transportation would be delayed 48hrs., Running late and not sure I'd even get to Texas Children's on time, ONLY to be informed that I would not be able to get another appointment until 3-4 months out. NO WAY, JOSE'! The procedure has been put off due to life's many challenges, say 3yrs. NOT TODAY, IT WAS CRUNCH TIME!!! I called to see if Ms. Carolyn w/ Dr. Cohen's office could help. She tried but to no avail (THANKS A MILLION MS. Carolyn!!!). So with time running out I decided to take matters into my own hands a keep TC in 100% communication of my every move. So I try again to start my car and it in no way turns over so I call my brother Richard for assistance. Well, what do you know, starts up tge first try! With 45 min. left I call to ler the team know I'm officially on my way. While speaking with the department personnel I was asked how long would be, I time it to about 20-25 min. Clearly coming for the opposite end of the city (SPRING/ FM 1960); late. AND WE'RE OFF! Sure Nothing would get in my way! However, If Things Can Go Wrong They Will! An accident 8 min. from our destination, before EXIT 1B. An eighteen wheeler and SUV's front end connected. THANK YOU YAHWEH for UNMERRITED FAVOR! It could've been us. So, now we're delayed once more. Nevertheless, something KEPT saying continue on to the hospital. When we arrived, I PARK in the WRONG garage. But I'm able to get to the information desk to check in. While finding out I am in the WRONG building. Moving as fast as I can without dragging my little one, I encourage him to run through the hall with me. "BET YOU CAN'T CATCH ME, SUGEE NANE (Lol, nickname.)!" NOW, you know we were told to walk down the hallway and NO running as children but this had to be there exception. I get to the 3rd floor and was told the 9th floor; 9th floor Nuroligy, 9th floor Nuroligy says after waiting 13 m. to check in, WRONG floor go down to 8. Making my way to 8 only to be told "This is the clinic, you must check in on 7." REALLY? Somehow, by passing the 7th floor I end up back where we started. 3! So up we go, the 7th floor. I hurry to the desk to check in. In hopes that I am able to continue. Knowing that ths crazy has hd me fighting an uphll battle for at least 1:45 min. Overwhelmed, I wait my turn. As I approach the desk to check in I was greeted with the most friendliest smle. Then before I could explain... "YOUR ALL SET, They should be calling you next!" So taken back by the early morning events tears began to well up in my eyes. At that moment Ms. Sandra the Out Patient registrar reassured me that everything will be just fine. (Ms. Sandra, THANK YOU FOR YOUR HELP💜) The young lady technician was just as nice, she made vitals easy breeze as she gave my son his V.I.P pajamas. Not to mention my son lost his comfort toy (Mickey & Goofy sports car from Walt Disneyworld) and an all out manhunt to get it back in time for surgery arose. Mission Impossible= Mission Accomplished! I also appreciate the kindness shown to my son by Miss Stephanie L. Child LIFE Specialist as she explained what would take place before he received Anastasia. I was TRULY satisfied with how she was able to put such a complexes procedure to a 3 yr.old. Then to have the children could pick their flavor to be administered during the sugercial preparation process was very considerate. By the way TC has the most thorough Social WORKS, they get right down to bussines. In a heartbeat . Our son is recovering well wih respect to minor Post- Operative pain. Most Importantly, I would like to say THANK YOU to the Anesthesiologist and Pre- Operative Personnel as well as Dr. Cohen and Residents. BE...

TCH was the 3rd and the very WORST Hospital my son was in. We started at Driscoll at Corpus Ch. transferred to Boston Children's at Boston MA because TCH denied us the first time. When we were sent to TCH from Boston (when they finally accepted us)was for a discharge plan home which never happened. The only reason we didn't stay at Boston was because it was very far from home(Brownsville Tx)if I could go back in time I would of done everything to stay at Boston. At TCH we were at the CVICU 18 floor, my baby had a tracheostomy and the nurses there were very UNEXPERIENCED with trach care I had to constantly be explaining them the length of suctioning because they would go way too deep causing trauma twice making him bleed from the trach!! & I have pictures I reported a few nurses even with Tracy but it still kept happening it got to the point where I had to print out a paper where it said the instructions of suctioning bc apparently they wouldn't read the paper that RTs had on the vent. My baby spent 9 months Hospital to Hosp. since birth &never made it home unfortunately. Another problem I had with this nurses was that they didn't know how to properly use the cooling blancket they would leave it freezing for long periods on him I would tell them not to put it too cold on him when I was there. Jill the NP even said a few times to go up on the temperature because it was too cold! Sometimes the nurses wouldn't listen to me because they always think they know everything but I learned alot from being so long in the Hospital with my son. My baby had an episode of being for too long on it making his blood pressure drop. A time I was doing trach care with a nurse got out of control because she didn't know how to do trach care, nurse next door had to come in and finish trach care with me, Drs had to come in and bag my son for a while. Things like this could have been prevented if only they would have more experienced nurses specially with TRACH CARE. I spoke with Tracy she did nothing I spoke to Jill and to the Palliative team also. All I wanted was the best quality life for him the time he had :-( not even at Driscoll I had this issues the nurses there were GREAT to him. Another thing is that Drs were SELF MEDICATING my son giving him unnecessary medicines that he did not need I know how sick he was with PVS but this Drs giving things he did not need made it worse and possibly killed him I strongly believe! He needed a cath to balloon the veins and didn't do it bc he supposedly had a fungus ball on his heart, started him on amphotericin which they stopped after a wk because at the end they came out with the conclusion it was not a fungus ball but more like a blood clot which I always knew and always told them (thats what they had found before at Boston) the last days he lived were very terrible he had a catheter to pee and they also caused trauma to him on his private part the Urologist came in (he took forever) heart rate in the 180s bc he was in SO much pain because he couldn't pee the cath was clotted when they removed it alot of blood came out and still like that they tried cathing him again and again I told them to please not too he was bleeding alot and he was in so much pain, he couldn't cry or move because he was completely paralyzed. They hurt my baby so much. I have everything written down with dates and everything. At the end NOTHING will ever bring me my baby back no matter what I do. I have alot more to say too many mistakes that we went through but it does not fit in this review I never stood quiet and I wish I could have done alot more to help my son I wish he would of had a better quality life and a lot of things like this like I said could have been prevented if they would have better nurses and better Drs too. The only thing that has me relieved is that my son is not suffering anymore and he's in a better place...