Riverside Medical Center Emergency Department — Local services in Kankakee

Came into the ER with shortness of breath and chest tightness. BP 210 over 110 per paramedic reading. I felt no empathy from staff they were very cold callused and even made off putting inside jokes with each other at my expense. I had been working 12hrs before the emergency and my hygiene was admittedly subpar.

My nurses came in with no masks and I gave them the rundown of my issue but told them I had no pain I just couldn't breathe and believed I had a stroke. They seemed annoyed by this response. Then the male nurse walked over to me and lifted my shirt without explaining what he was doing. My reaction was to quickly pull it back down as he didn't prepare me for anything. His exact words were "shirts coming up" no explanation no fore warning very cold but I accepted this bad behavior at the time as I was still struggling to breathe. They connected me to the devices while having casual conversation. Afterward a second female nurse monitored my lungs with a stethoscope, took my temp which was 98.6 and assured me my vitals were in the normal range.

ER doctor Jacob Gianuzzi came in with no mask and asked me what the issue was. I explained my symptoms and told him I believed I might have a blood clot. He seemed triggered by my response but composed himself. He asked what made me think I had blood clots and I told him I could feel something moving around in my leg and that my primary concern was blood clotting. He assured me that he would check this out.

An x-ray tech came in and took x-ray of my chest with no mask.

Then a nurse came in masked up all of a sudden, the tone changed and she asked me very coyly if I would be interested in taking a COVID test. I politely declined for personal reasons.

Suddenly the ER doctor Jacob Gianuzzi (according to my release paperwork) returned seemingly upset. He asked why I refused the COVID test. I told him personal reasons that I didn't want to debate about. This seemed to trigger him more. He doubled down saying I can't help you if you don't get tested as you might have influenza, mind you I presented to the hospital with a critical BP level 210 110, tightness in chest, and shortness of breathe. As he tried to coerce me I layed on the bed struggling to breathe. I felt he tried to leverage my emergency to coerce me into getting an unwanted medical procedure. I asked which COVID test they used (the long invasive brain probing one or mouth) and was it PCR based. His response alarmed me as he said it didn't matter which test it was and that PCR DNA based tests are the best to determine COVID, which I found to be a very unsettling response from a healthcare professional.

At this point talking was becoming harder and harder. I felt he was dead set on doing the procedure for whatever reason. Seeing that my denial of a medical procedure had triggered him I didn't feel comfortable in his care any longer and requested to be discharged. I was treated very coldly once I refused to take a PCR test for covid which I explained was for my own personal and religious beliefs.

At my discharge request he agreed and said a nurse would be in with my discharge paper work. The nurse came in and took my temp twice which showed a normal reading of 98.6 further ruling out the likelihood of influenza.

I honestly got the sense that the last minute temp checks were an attempt to force COVID protocol on me had my temp been in abnormal range.

I don't understand their reason for denying me critical care and trying to do COVID protocols on me against my will.

I was rolled to the front door in wheelchair still struggling to breathe but God is good and I hope some light can come from this situation.

I am experiencing those same symptoms as I write this review but do not trust the professionalism of the ER staff at...

I don't know what they got going on over there but they're very shady people.

Avoid like the plague.

My wife was a nurse there and got health insurance for our whole family. Yet when I got a microdasectomy on my spine in February now they're trying to pass me on the Medicaid or Medicare and refuse to cover it even though they are self-insured company.

Furthermore they refuse to cooperate at all and provide me with any of the legally necessary paperwork to file my appeal.

Their purposely being difficult at every turn. All I got to say is two people can play that game. I tried to do this cordially, but evidently Riverside doesn't want to operate like that and would instead rather talk to the Department of Labor.

The health insurance industry in this country is completely broken and needs to be completely uprooted like a weed.

Furthermore they keep sending conflicting information.

The website list my bill is being $20,000 yet I just received a bill in the mail that lists only $5,000 in charges.

Fix this immediately. I'm not the kind of person to forget about this. I'm not the kind of person to roll over and just pay it because you want to get a bonus this year.

My wife paid you guys for my health insurance every week. Now it's your turn to provide insurance like your legally...

So my daughter went into the RMC with severe abdominal pain twice in a week. It ended up being kidney stone(s). The first time she was sent home told it would pass and told they can't do anything about it in our area. They would have to transfer her up north. The nurses were wonderful but when it came down to being treated we were told there was no one area who could do pediatric urology. So they said she would have to transferred to Comer's in Chicago by Ambulance. I asked if we could bring her straight up there because it was non life-threatening and the pain was controlled by meds. To save money of ambulance ride. They said NO we would have to sign her out AMA. So she took the Ambulance ride to Comers. At Comers she spent the night and got no test done but put on meds to control the pain and was released and told to come back in a week. WELL We found out Dr. Frye from Kankakee sees pediatric patients. And could of taken care of her but RMC didn't tell us that. I thought RMC was the best in the area. Now we will be out a lot of money because they can't recommend a doctor near by. Or at least point us to him because they have a contract with Comers/University of Chicago. ER doctor even said they had a...