But you know, it's the LAST place that the clientele need to interact with uncaring people, and I'm just talking about day to day interactions.

(And I LOVE those in the field who maintain their humanity and kindness)

So what is it that made it so easy for people in the business of caring for people to be so uncaring?

Is it the industry, with so much pain and misery on view?

Is it the city, San Francisco, where coming across a homeless person asleep (or dead?) is an everyday occurrence?

How very very sad!

It's assumed she was in hospital gown and wearing ID bracelet.

We do see a lot of people passed out all over town, drunk or nodding on heroin or oxy. I've poked a few to make sure they were still alive. Most of the time I just walk by. These are people on the street and not a staff only accessible staircase. If I found someone at work I would not step over them to report them to a nurse particularly a woman in her 50's.

This is what you get when you destroy the notion of the social good

is a very big deal--let alone an unconscious patient. Normally staff would scramble, maybe call a code. This is very odd. And edit to add: why would the nurse call the SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT, instead of going to investigate and help this patient? There was just a complete breakdown of responsibility and duty here. SF General is going to pay out, big time.

patient and ensuring she was cared for from the get-go) reports an unconscious person in the stairwell, as a former nurse myself you wouldn't have been able to STOP me from checking on her. Were they afraid it was some sort of violent crime scene or something? Just fucking stupid and negligent.

if hospital staffs were a tad more competent and humane.

of rotting corpse????

She was only being treated for a UTI and was not considered terminal or critical.

San Francisco General Hospital Foundation is dedicated to promoting excellence in research, education and care for all at San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center.

http://sfghf.net/our_mission.html

I see CARE is last in the list of priorities.

Orderlies are not trained to help unconscious patients. As far as I can tell, the orderly did what he was supposed to do - report the situation to a higher-up. The nurse also seemed to have done what he or she was supposed to do:

Stephen La Plante, former chief of public safety for the city Public Health Department, which formerly oversaw security at San Francisco General, (said), "It's the deputies who go check, who perform the well-being check for anyone found outside a hospital ward... That is just the standard of practice in American hospitals. I would never expect a nurse to go outside the ward, down a hallway and into a fire escape stairwell. That is automatically the purview of the security force."

Check if human being lying in staff only stairwell was alive?

Check if human being lying in staff only stairwell had an ID bracelet?

Show the deputy where he found the human being.

Since this is a stairwell exposed to the elements, should the orderly made sure the woman lying there was not cold?

Should the orderly have followed up with a "Hey what happened to that unconscious woman I stepped over twice earlier?" later in the day.

Or should he have locked the door behind him and just go about his job after reporting it to the nurse....

Why would you send a deputy to assist someone in medical distress (unconscious), seems like paramedics would have be the obvious choice assuming the nurse was unable walk down the hallway herself.

Clear effort to pass the blame to the sheriffs department who are probably also to blame but this callous indifference is disgusting.

Once he reported this incident to his superiors, I see no reason for him not to assume that all these things would be taken care of promptly. There may be problems with the policies here, or the ball may have been dropped by a deputy or someone else higher than the orderly. But, no, I don't think the orderly should have been expected to, for instance, make his way to the supply closet and pull out a blanket and take it for this woman on his own volition. I just don't think hospitals work like that. Maybe they should, but that's not really under the control of the orderly.

What could possibly go wrong?

to check out as it should have been then it looks like the security which is the Sheriffs Department really screwed up. From what I've read another article that's an isolated stairwelland nursing staff really had no business going out there and checking without security present.