The last time I was in the hospital I had someone stop by to visit at 1:15 A.M. and none of the staff seemed to think this was a problem or even out of the ordinary. Today I’m watching an episode of Emergency and one of the Paramedics says it’s after visiting hours.
This got me wondering, are visiting hours outdated everywhere or do some hospitals still restrict them? Or are the ones that don’t have specified hours the rare ones?
The hospital I worked at had “quiet hours” when visitors had to keep noise down, but they would accept guests 24 hours a day.
As you might guess, it varies. At Mount Sinai in Manhattan, “Visiting hours are 8:00 a.m. - 8:00 p.m.” At Marymount Hospital [part of Cleveland Clinic] visiting hours “are 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.”
I’m a hospital librarian, and I just searched this subject yesterday. The answer is “it depends on the hospital.” Each hospital, and department within, sets its own visiting hours. ICU/CCU might have restricted visiting hours, while a med/surg floor has open hours.
Ditto. A few months ago I was told to leave at 8pm (or was it 10? I don’t remember.) Other hospitals, no problem.
Sure, but can they really force you to leave against your will? Let’s say your loved one is expected to pass within the next day or two. Would they really force you to leave only to be called 3 hours later to be told they had died?
In my experience, clinicians (doctors, nurses and other staff) have brains and hearts. If there was a situation in which a loved one was expected to pass shortly, I expect they would be accommodating. It does help if you keep your cool and don’t blow up at them, as they do have procedures for handling combative persons (patients and visitors).
I work for a healthcare organization that runs several hospitals; our hospitals have no set visiting hours. Visitors are permitted 24 hours a day in general, though visitation may be limited for certain patients based on their condition.
In the case of a terminal patient in their final hours, I can’t imagine visitors being asked to leave, unless they were causing a disturbance to other patients.
A couple of years ago, when my father was in ICU, there were limited visiting hours. My brother, at the same time, was in cardiac at the same hospital - those were more generally open visiting hours (with some limitations).
Which meant coordinating across the two units so my brother could be brought over to see our father after our fathers’ surgery, but only during the ICU visiting hours, even though they were patients at the same hospital.
ICUs typically have very restrictive visiting hours. Also some hospitals enforce very strict limitations during flu season.
mmm
The hospital where I used to work had a comparable restriction, with other restrictions on visiting hours in the OB unit (fathers only outside certain hours) but hospice patients could have visitors at any time.
My experience is that even hospitals and units with the most stringent visiting hours will make exceptions. For example, if someone works nights, or whose work conflicts with the published visiting hours. The key is to explain the situation and ask politely.
All rules regarding patients exist as a way to convince loudmouths and the uncouth to leave. Even if the rules dictate people leave at a certain hour, paid employees will flaunt the rules for who is polite and courteous and is eliminating problems.
A boor will be shown the door.
Even someone who is not uncouth or a loudmouth can be escorted out if the patient wants them to leave.
Part of the change may be due to the move to private rooms for patients–the hospital where I work actually has couches that fold out to provide beds in the non-ICU rooms.
Another change is allowing children to visit. When I was about seven (round about the time Emergency! was on) my grandfather spent about a week in the hospital, but the common rule was no children under 12. I spent several evenings unsupervised in the hospital waiting room. A couple of years later my toddler cousin was in the hospital, and he was actually wheeled down to the waiting room to see his siblings and cousins since we couldn’t go to his room.
When I was about seven I was in the hospital for a few months. I was not allowed to see my kid sister at all, and I was only allowed to see my parents for a couple of hours each day.
I just checked that same hospital’s present policy: quiet time from 10am to 7am, with the possibility of arranging overnight visits.
I think a big difference is private rooms vs wards. Anyone in a private room is highly unlikely to have restrictions on visiting and in some cases they’ll give you a fold out bed (at no cost) if a guest wants to stay over night with the patient.
Some still do - but they aren’t as limited as they used to be. I remember when visiting hours weren’t a single long period of time like 8am-8pm, but multiple shorter periods, like 1-3pm and then 5-7pm.
Of course they can force you to leave the hospital. The question is whether they will escalate the situation enough to make that happen. There was a drunk guy causing disruption in my part of the hospital. I told him to leave and he said no. I then told him I would call the cops, and he got up and left immediately. In this case, I absolutely would have called the cops.
Hospitals have a security code for a disruptive patient, visitor, employee, etc. and if it is paged, the guards will come running and also call the police if things don’t de-escalate.