A LONG-ASS thread. So after much heartache last night,thought I figured out how to log mom’s health aide into Mychart to collect her Covid result which is required for her to enter moms facility.We were told it would take 24 hrs. 24 hrs pass.Nothing.

Some part of me had been expecting this.Yesterday,I’d been told by every person I called--pleaded w/,begged,argued with-- that it was the system I was up against.That no single cog of the system could change the data trapped in the blackhole of the system.

I again call Mychart (the tech company that manages online patient charts)&NYC Covid hotline (both of which are now entered my speeddial).Testing site doesn’t have a number listed.Yesterday it became apparent that aide couldn’t give me her last address due to her lack of English.

Today,I found out that BOTH her name & bday had been misspelled.I asked aide how this happened.She told me she was hospitalized for emergency surgery some yrs ago.She didnt have insurance.Someone came to take down her info.

Translator was promised but didnt show up or maybe showed up too late?She couldnt remember.But upshot was that her info was misspelled & she didnt have English to correct (plus she was trying to get lifesaving surgery so her mind understandable elsewhere while she was in the ER)

She couldnt have konwn the havoc it would wreak on rest of life in the US. None of her fam members speak English so its not like they could help her. So here,I am trying to correct all this info in the age of Covid. &selfishly too. It's for my mom who desperately needs her aide.

None of her fam members speak English so its not like they could have helped her earlier.I'm the 1st fluent bilingual speaker she has met whos willing to do this. But Im not her.there are privacy concerns.I tell ppl Im her translator & shes at my side w/ all her documents in hand

No,she needs to speak directly on her own behalf,we r told. Is there official translator avail?I ask. No,not right now,we are told. So what is she to do? Wait,we are told.But my mom can't wait.The other aide at hospital is waiting to be relieved &this aide needs to work to earn $

To protect HER privacy,we are told,whatever misspellings made in an ER a decade earlier that have entered her official file can neither be corrected nor disclosed TO HER.For that reason,she cant collect her covid status bc her identity isn’t verified.

And now,it seems like to wait for a translator,she will have to give up the job for which she is waiting for a translator in the 1st place. Is this a joke? Kafka couldn't have written this better,I think.

I'm angry,panicked&of course,selfishly thinking of my mother lying in her hospital bed waiting for her aide & of the exhausted aide waiting to be relieved.This single clerical error on a file made out of carelessness or impatience has wreaked dire consequences on multiple lives.

I think of the countless ppl I talked to in the last 24 hrs telling me, sometimes aggressively "IM NOT BEING RUDE,I'M JUST DOING MY JOB" It reminds me of when ppl scream "i'm not a racist but..." Its not that I dont believe them but--

it's the quality of how one does one's job--the understanding that what u perceive as ur small part has enormous implications-- that determines judgement of whether its a job well-done & whether you have actually helped someone or merely served as the cog in the broken machine.

With my aide,& perhaps considering this political moment,many ppl told us to our faces "we are not being racist!" like it was a shield against presumed accusations that we were sure to make in the future. But racism isnt abt the statement "im not a racist."

It's abt the care u take-or dont take-when u encounter that poor,powerless immigrant in the ER&u know if u save a few seconds by not verifying her info,she wont catch u & no one will ever know it was you who made the mistake. Racism can be abt those small & all too human mistakes

The "system" is formidable but its also as big&formidable & as small&trivial as the responsibility we choose to take for our parts,the repercussions of which wont be felt for yrs down the line & in instances when the fault won't ever be traceable to you.

And one day,you'll be griping abt the system perhaps completely oblivious to the part U once played in someone else's hopeless navigation of the system. At the end of this very long day,thats what I'm thinking about. My own responsibility &possible hypocrisies.I hope to do better