Wellington's Bowen Hospital Management & Evolution Healthcare, Be Ashamed. Be VERY Ashamed.

Early last week, I was done a lovely favour by someone at Bowen Private Hospital in Wellington. I wanted to express my gratitude in the form of some yummy morning tea delivery which, a couple of days later, I endeavored to go about arranging.

I had noted, while I was on site, exterior signage that seemed to indicate the existence of a cafe. The only phone number I could find for said cafe, however, was on a Facebook page. But upon dialing, it gave out a "no such number" tone.

So I called the hospital's reception. I gave them the detailed reason behind my desire to figure out what the situation was regarding the cafe.

Chain of Incongruent Communications

The receptionist advised me that the cafe was now integrated into the hospital's general kitchen operation. (Now, YES, that sounded a bit strange to me, but do remember, as you read on, that this is exactly what I was TOLD by said receptionist.)

I was duly put through to the kitchen and spoke to a friendly chap (whose name I was given) whom I believed to head up the hospital's kitchen operation. I began by checking that the understanding given to me by the receptionist was correct. He confirmed that indeed it was, and added further commentary.

I thus proceeded with my request, being:  Could he please organise a delivery of some delicious morning tea for the relevant staff members? Not only was this possible, but he was gracious in his description of what he would deliver, since he appeared to know the relevant staff and their preferences.

He was to make the delivery either that morning, or - if he found they'd already had their morning tea - the following morning. He told me the very reasonable price, and I offered to do a bank transfer while he was on the phone. He said that, no, the hospital had to send me an invoice. I duly provided my email address to enable same.

One Week Later . . .

Now almost a week later with no invoice and no indication from the intended recipients of my intended gesture that the brief had been executed, I rang the hospital's reception. I gave the largely uninterested receptionist an explanation of the issue, and she put me back to the kitchen, telling me the name of the head of kitchen who was on duty that day, in place of the previous staff member I had actually made the arrangement with.

And that's where things got really. bloody. shameful, Bowen Hospital management, and I hope you're reading this even. if. you. couldn't. give. a. shit.

So this other "head of kitchen", whose name I'd been given, was the one who answered. And what a horrid, rude, intentionally cloth-eared, misogynistic young character he was - one of those whereby it's just as well he doesn't have an actual public-facing role.

Who Gave (Intentionally Cloth-Eared) Hospital Staff the Authority to Chastise A Member of the Public, Anyway?

I explained yet again the reason for the call, and (without allowing me to even get close to a conclusion) he launched into an unbridled, smart-ass chastisement of me for my misunderstanding (refusing to acknowledge that it was a case of my having been misinformed by his own colleagues) of the tie-up between the cafe and the hospital. And I DO mean, it was a chastisement. And clearly, a very misplaced one.

He launched into a jolly good misogynistic telling off of me:  "We are a hospital kitchen. We are NOT set up to act like a cafe! etc etc". He refused to accept any part of my explanation that I'd not only been given the understanding I'd been given, but that I'd actually made an arrangement with his colleague, that said colleague had willingly and happily made.

I asked him (or I endeavored to) (a) why his counterpart would have told me he'd do what he'd undertaken to do, and (b) why someone wouldn't have had the decency to email or phone me (since I'd left both forms of contact) if some decision was thereafter made that they wouldn't do what they'd undertaken to do.

Misogyny Has No Place in Modern Society . . . But Least of All In A Hospital Setting

Then he coolly asked my name. I thought - for a mistaken moment in time - that he was actually going to be slightly respectful and look up some records somewhere regarding the conversation and the arrangement made with his counterpart.

More fool me.

He wanted my name, as I was about to discover, because he was about to up-level his smart-assed misogyny even further:

"Well, Ms Kelly (he began) ..... "

I don't remember the specific verbatim smart-assery that came after that, because frankly, I was incensed that a private (or any) hospital setting allowed their staff to speak to members of the public in such a manner, and certainly in relation to an issue of their own non-performance.

So, Hi there, Mr Misogynist Smart-Ass Head of Kitchen on Thursday, September 12, 2024, at Wellington's Bowen Hospital . . . Here's the commentary I promised regarding your rudeness.

You may note, therefore, that I'm a woman of my word.

You may also note that despite the fact that you fully deserve me to include your name (which I know) in this article, I'll refrain from doing so, to allow you to reflect upon your sheer and totally misplaced smart-assedness and whether or not you are really doing anything positive for the Bowen Hospital brand or the brand of its operating entity, Evolution Healthcare.

Update:

So, this is the update you have when you're not having an update.

I thought I would call Bowen Hospital back and let the hospital or duty manager know of the existence of this commentary and provide them with the opportunity for comment (which I could include here).

I asked the receptionist for the name of the hospital's Duty Manager. "Mary", she told me - offering to put me through.

"Mary" - for whom English sounded like a decidedly second language - answers, sounding as though I had roused her from a deep sleep. Mary tells me she is not the duty manager. Someone else is.

I tell Mary why I'm calling and ask for an email address to which to send the link to this story. She wouldn't give me one. She instead offered to take my phone number and have the real duty manager call me back, which she said would be "very shortly". As in, "definitely" this afternoon.

Well, the real duty manager has, of course, never called. And, I'm guessing, never will.

Bringing Back Very Bad Old Memories . . .

So, I decided to see if Evolution Healthcare, its ownership entity, had an email address online. It doesn't. But some of what I discovered are a dozen other "healthcare" operations it owns, do have an email address available. I emailed a link to each of them, asking them to pass on the link to the corporate Evolution Healthcare entity, since it doesn't have an email address available. We'll see what happens in that regard. That's six other recipients (including their "media team" that now have the opportunity to acknowledge or maybe, who knows, even bother to respond) to my feedback.

What really concerned me by way of a discovery in that process, though, is that this "Evolution Healthcare" owns BOTH of the private hospitals in Wellington. Which is HORRIFYING to me, because the other private hospital is the Wakefield private hospital in Newtown.

I have had four surgeries in my adult life. I really only needed two. (And, possibly even, only ever one, but it was of course profitable for certain other parties to convince me otherwise.) Surgeries two and three (which had to be conducted at a public hospital) were corrective measures, due to the horrendously botched nature of the first surgery at this Wakefield horror establishment. I had, in fact, ended up ambulanced from there to the intensive care unit in the public hospital after the mess I came out of Wakefield's operating theatre in.

The final surgery (also at the Wakefield private hospital House of Horror) was one I equally would rather have forgotten - for multiple reasons, including staff incompetence and hospital management dishonesty when I reported one of the at least two instances of it.

But I should have known better before I entered those damned doors for that last one. My best friend's father went in for heart surgery and departed in an undertaker's van.

Update:

OK. So this is really concerning.

There is NO phone number and NO email address for the corporate umbrella entity, Evolution Healthcare. I've been trawling their corporate website. There is NO way to contact anyone at the entity that owns all these downstream medical businesses.

Meaning:  If you were a patient at any of these subsidiaries, there appears to be NO WAY TO DIRECTLY ESCALATE a concern or a complaint up past the actual downstream business i.e. the subject of your concern or complaint.

Even when you click on the photos and titles of the "Leadership Team" . . . NOTHING.

The entire corporate operation and its website is without any semblance of a phone number or even an email address.

Well . . . THAT would give you great confidence, wouldn't it?

Seriously, people need to do a lot more research before they, literally, put their lives and the lives of their loved ones, in the unaccountable (and, regrettably, in my own personal experience, arrogant and incompetent) hands of this entity and its downstream enterprises.

Lest you leave the way my best friend's father left.