Reference no: EM132229744

You are the new CEO of a small nonprofit hospital located in a rural area. At noon, a small child was been admitted to your emergency room complaining of generalized, severe stomach pains. He has no other obvious symptoms. His caregiver is from a non-English speaking country, and her English language skills are limited so attempts to communicate with her have been frustrating. The child’s parents left town a few hours ago heading for a conference. The caregiver is unclear as whether the parents were flying or driving to the conference, but she was able to provide your staff with their hotel information. So, attempts to locate the parents have been unsuccessful. Your staff did contact by their destination hotel, and they were told the parents are scheduled to arrive there sometime late this evening. The on-call doctor, a surgeon, fears the child may have an abdominal illness that requires immediate surgery. However, when talking with you he admits he’s not positive of his diagnosis, as he’s not a pediatrician, and his practice is limited to orthopedics not abdominal issues. Without a reliable medical history he tells you that he can’t estimate the degree of risk to the child’s health if exploratory surgery is undertaken, BUT he also warns that not operating may pose a risk if his tentative diagnosis is correct. The next nearest hospital is located two hours away so transporting the child is risky and your hospital has not created a policy of any type to deal with this kind of emergency situation. Please explain the steps you would take to solve this dilemma include in this discussion both internal resources and staff as well as outside resources and consultants. This question should also explore the creation of organizational policies and their development, committee creation (if needed), and any financial, legal and ethical considerations. While you only have an hour or two to make this decision for this case, but recognize that you also need to develop policies and procedures to help your organization should future situations such as this occur again.