Getting from Lancaster to Seattle was a logistical nightmare. I spent the vast majority of my time in the hospital laying in bed. I slept and I tried to eat and sometimes I'd watch television and then sleep again. I knew that I would need to leave the hospital, but I did not spend a single moment thinking about how it would actually take place.
And yet there was an enormous sense of urgency that surrounded me. I could sense it at the edges. A small thing, like the chart affixed to the end of my bed. Even in Lancaster, there was information on that clipboard that I knew nothing about. The sisters would come into my room throughout the day, taking my temperature, my blood pressure, asking how I felt. Every once in awhile they might withdraw more blood. Numbers and letters filled the charts. Doctors reviewed the numbers and letters. They conferred with one another. They called my parents and shared information and discussed options and gave direction to the sisters who would come into my room again, rousing me from my slumber, asking me to swallow this small plastic cup of thick medicine that tasted like bananas.
So much activity, so much concern, so many plans being made all around me.
It is difficult to trace back to the beginning of the logistics required to transport me from Lancaster to Seattle. At first, I thought, it was the insurance company. They play a large part in determining my final destination: if they are going to pay for all of my travel expenses (which they will), they are not about to just fly my anywhere in the country. There are procedures. There are protocols. For the kind of expense necessary, they will only cover a few possible destinations.
To get a sense for the kind of expense required, it is necessary to understand a few things.
- I waited perhaps a bit too long before mustering the courage to visit the Health Centre. Because of that, I have become a considerable travel risk. As evidenced by the rapid departure of blood from my body when my thrashing sleep had pulled an I.V. needle from my arm, there is a great deal of risk to assume when putting me in an ambulance, or on an airplane.
- Because of that risk, it has been mandated (whether by the Royal Lancaster Infirmary or the insurance company, I do not know) that I be joined in my travels by both a doctor and a nurse. They will come from the Royal Airforce, or some such, and their travel costs will also need to be covered.
- This will be a non-stop flight. Period. We will fly directly from London to wherever the final destination may be to minimize any possible risk associated with moving me from one craft to another.
- Still related to transportation risks, I will need six seats for myself. I think they will actually remove six seats -- two rows of three -- from the left-hand side of the airplane, to be replaced by a stretcher of sorts. There will be a curtain for privacy, and hooks for antibiotics or blood that might need to slowly drip drip drip.
Not including the ambulance ride from Lancaster to London, then (which was probably covered by socialized medicine in England anyway) we will need nine airline tickets -- one way -- to be purchased within a few days of my departure. A quick price check shows that a one way ticket, non-stop, from Heathrow to SeaTac is roughly $1,000. I'm not exactly sure what the overall price tag was in 1990, but $10,000 would turn out to be a drop in the bucket by the end of the summer.
