Last night I had a little medical emergency and needed to get to a walk in clinic stat. Let’s just say I got the full Lower Mainland doctor shortage experience. I first pulled up to the Brickyard Medical Clinic in Cloverdale at around 5:30 p.m. only to be told they had reached their maximum patient total for the day. I then drove to the Clover Care Medical Clinic and was told the same thing. I must’ve had a look of panic on my face because the receptionist quickly pulled out a pamphlet titled ‘Medimap.ca’. She told me if I go to that website and type in my city it will show me a list of nearby clinics and the ones still accepting patients.
A quick browse of the list showed almost all clinics were at capacity or had a minimum two hour wait. At this point what started out as a little medical emergency quickly turned into full blown panic mode. “What if I can’t get in anywhere? What if my “issue” takes over my entire body? What if I can’t do tomorrow’s show and Ian Power squashes me?” I decided to bite the bullet and drive to the the Morgan Creek Medical Walk-In Clinic that was showing an hour and a half wait time. Or so that’s where I thought I was heading. Google maps ending up sending me to a Cactus Club in Morgan Creek where at that point I think I had a full blown meltdown in the parking lot. Not my best moment.
When I called the Morgan Creek office in a mad fit of confusion and anger she told me I was “so close” and to just walk five minutes down 15nd Street to find them. The five minute walk turned out to be twenty minutes but alas, I finally made it to the freakin’ clinic and after an almost two hour wait, at 8pm, I received my long awaited prescription. Today, I’m happy to report my medical “emergency” is almost completely cleared up. However my road to get there was anything but smooth.
Vanessa