So near, and yet so far from ER

The medication had been making me ill for a week. Just about every side effect listed on the instructions had hit. Then, on a Monday evening, feeling worse, I reread the list. My latest symptoms fell under the column of ''Call your doctor if you experience... "

Which is how I ended up at the emergency room of Massachusetts General Hospital. I entered the ER shortly after 8:30 p.m. and approached the nurse at a desk.

''Sign in here and wait over there because we'll call you quickly," the nurse said, pointing to a spot next to a wall. There was no chair there, so I slumped into a heap on the floor -- feeling rather pitiful but ever so grateful to be in the care of a world-class hospital, where service would be speedy and attentive.

Sure enough, moments later, a nurse called my name. She asked earnestly about my symptoms, detailing them at length on a form. She checked my blood pressure and heart rate. Both were normal and good -- and the markers of doom in an ER waiting room.

''You could be here for quite a while," the nurse said as she smiled and scanned my face, as if to make sure I understood her words. ''But it's not that you are being ignored."

I was consigned to the ranks of miserable but not critical -- the ranks of those who would wait.

I waded into the waiting room. A ceiling-mounted television blared with an episode of ''The Apprentice." A woman moaned in a wheelchair. A man sat with his head bowed, blood seeping from a bandage on his forehead.

Hours slipped by, marked by the parade of television shows. ''The Apprentice" gave way to the local news and then to ''The Tonight Show." The misery quotient rose. After two hours, I queried a nurse about my place on the list. Just seven in front of me. An hour later it was just one person ahead of me. An hour later, still one.

As the clock rounded 1:30 a.m., my symptoms subsided. My head throbbed but did not pound, the nausea was just a dull thrum. I approached the nurse again. How could there have been one person ahead of me for a full hour?

She pointed to her computer screen. There were half a dozen boxes. Each patient is assigned to a box, she explained. The most acute patients are in one box, the least acute in another. The acute box list moves most swiftly, nudging out the other lists every time. There was one person ahead of me in my box, the least-acute box.

There was no guarantee I'd be seen anytime soon, she said.

I made a calculation. I could wait hours more, or I could go home, try to sleep and call my doctor in six hours. I offered my wrist to the nurse and she clipped the plastic band from it.

As walked out of the ER, I felt grateful for having had peace of mind knowing that medical care had been so close. If only I'd also been able to access it.

Sarah Schweitzer can be reached at schweitzer@globe.com.