moving special needs child to STT

Hmmm. Have you talked to a attorney just to get an idea of what you can possibly do?

Currently special needs children in the usvi are not getting much help or support. In the past the islands have sent those children to the mainland and are paying outrageous fees to have those children warehoused. Most of these children have been sent to other institutions due to age or returned to the islands due to delinquent payments by the Virgin Island government.

Bottom line...the Virgin island government is not taking care of their responsibility. However , we must also ask why we are spending hundreds of thousands dollars per child to warehouse them in the states. Who should pay? Who is responsible?

Do everything you can to keep your child in the states. Living in the islands will be a major problem for everyone concerned.

well my only experience at the hospital grossed me out because they don't even have hot water there!! NOT EVEN AT THE HOSPITAL!! so i'd worry about your daughter getting adequate treatment, as well as her having adequate daycare/caretaking by qualified and trained people. good luck, this must be terrible for you

I would recommend that you get a better attorney than one who would use comments from people on a message board to argue a case in court! A quick check by anyone would reval that the hospital has hot water. What an insane statement. For every one of those statements you can find testimonials of people thanking the staff at the hospital for taking such good care of them while there after hearing so many bad things about the hospital.
Ronnie

The best advice I can give you is to approach the situation from a financial perspective. Make calls to the hospital and doctors offices and find out what the health care costs would be for your daughter. As I am sure you are aware, for emergency you can have insurance that will fly your daughter to a more advanced (for lack of better word) hospital. Presenting the judge with the costs of care on island versus where you are now - would be a better argument than just the fact that island's health care is not up to your standards. We do have doctors and a good hospital and nurses, etc. so the judge may not favor your opinion. Also consider your daughter's quality of life. Moving to the islands could possibly be a good thing for her. Try to keep an open mind and consider all options. Her doctor's reccomendation would be the most crucial in your decisions and the judge's. I imagine - from a woman's perspective that your wife didn't think the move to the mainland would be permanent and I understand why she would want to return. For your daughter's sake, I hope you two can come to an agreement.

Teresa

I'm telling you right now that I was in the ER for over 14 hours and none of the bathrooms there had hot water. Perhaps I should have been more clear that I was talking about my personal experiences in the hospital (i'm sure behind the scenes there is hot water, or at least I hope so). the entire time i was there, I had no personal access to hot water. I was with my boyfriend who had a serious intestinal infection and was puking and crapping like crazy. thus i was washing my hands constantly out of fear i'd contract whatever he had. NONE of the bathrooms have hot water (and there are zero drinking fountains in the ER, however the staff was nice enough to give me a cup of water from their cafeteria room). Thus i was totally grossed out that in germ-filled area such an ER, that they wouldn't even have hot water. I saw ER staff and doctors using the same bathroom as I was and if they were only washing their hands with cold water, that is very unsanitary. I'm not saying the staff wasn't wonderful (because they were great and very nice), but the hygene at the hospital did not seem so good.

It has actually been proven that hot water doesn't rid your hands of germs. It is the scrubbing action with soap that rids your hands of germs and dirt. To have water hot enough to kill germs would burn your hands. It is a common misconception. I am just thankful if people attempt to wash their hands, it is better than not. But don't worry, the lack of hot water does not make it unsanitary. I am sorry your experience wasn't the best. I too have heard both good and bad experiences about the hospital. It all depends on where you come from. People from other islands seem to like the hospital whereas people from some mainland areas tend to think it is not the greatest. I don't have much experience to talk about, but the two visits I have had with the children was top notch. I have no complaints.

Teresa

This is obviously a sideline to the original question, but I am interested in when your ER visit occurred. There have been a good many changes in the recent past including Joint Commission accreditation.

We were at the hospital January 21, 2005. I don't want people to think we had a terrible experience at the hospital, because the staff was very nice, we didn't have to wait terribly long, and the doctors were attentive to my boyfriend's illness, running lots of tests and whatnot. I just didn't feel like it was that clean-- aside from the cold water issues, the floors weren't clean, trash cans were overflowing, etc. It's not like there were roaches everywhere, but just in comparison to stateside hospitals, I'd say the standards were lower here. Maybe hot water isn't necessary to get rid of germs like Teresa suggested, but I wouldn't want to wash my dishes in cold water or do my laundry with just cold water... maybe i'm brainwashed by hot water conveniences 🙂
I also thought that it was weird not to have any drinking fountains at a hospital-- i know there is a huge push for water conservation, but the vending machines that sold water were out of service, and there was 1 soda machine that worked, but being somewhere for 14 hours without access to drinking water was hard!!

It is true. Warm water does make me 'feel' cleaner. I don't know about washing dishes in cold water as far as getting them the cleanest, but I do conserve water to the point of washing dishes with the same water and it gets cool after a while. Sigh. I wish I could have a dishwasher. Anyway, I can understand the machines at the hospital being out of drinks, etc. I don't know why, but every place seems to run out of something at one time or another. Wendy's keeps running out of baked potatos for example. I have learned to not get my hopes up and after a while I am just pleasantly suprised when a coke rolls out of the machine instead of a sold out light.

MEA, basing opinions on comparisons between the island and mainland almost always brings about dissappointment of some kind. It makes it harder and harder for me to relate to mainlanders on the board with questions when I understand more and more that the island is just a different world with different, similar, same, opposite, etc. things than what I was used to on the mainland. I hope you don't feel that your opinion of the hospital is 'wrong', but rather worded to be rather a one sided type of review. Trust me there are worse hospitals on the mainland and better hospitals. Again, I find myself at a loss to balance the description of our hospital. Anyway, I hope you don't have to have any further experiences in the emergency room. Never a fun ordeal.

We have either confused, frustrated, or scared away manofpositivity. I hope he posts again so we understand more of his situation. It is not terribly unique, but still stressful I am sure.

Teresa

Hello, I am very sorry for your situation and I wish you all the blessings that you need. Last week a girl in my speech class did her speech on her brother that has Cerebral Palsy. I think she might be able to help you. We live here and her brother lives in the states so she will have alot of answer's for you.
Please E-mail her at dianefrancis@hotmail.com
good luck
Elise