A California couple were on an around-the-world trip, when the husband fell gravely ill and very nearly died. He had merely stubbed his toe in Japan, but by the time the couple arrived in Europe, that injury had developed into an internal infection with life-threatening complications.
In Rome, the patient’s resultant congestive heart failure had worsened to the point that his heart stopped beating. Fortunately, local doctors at the receiving hospital in Rome were able to resuscitate him.
His travel company, which is in the process of switching over to Cavalry Travel Insurance, asked Redpoint for help overseeing their client’s care.
The patient’s wife requested that her husband be transferred from the private clinic to a public hospital in Rome. In the meantime, Redpoint’s dispatched critical care paramedic had arrived at his bedside, and handled the transfer in an ambulance from the private hospital’s ICU to the public hospital’s critical-care emergency room.
The Redpoint medic liaised with the patient’s new Italian doctor and helped the patient and his wife understand the process, expedited the patient’s care, and kept the travel company updated at every step.
After the patient began to recover, the hospital staff noted that they would not start a physical therapy program without the consent of his doctor. Redpoint’s critical care paramedic instead started to work with the patient directly, teaching him the physio treatment on his own, which was to be continued when the man returned home.
Ultimately the patient was released and cleared for travel home to San Diego.
It was the small details of the paramedic’s assistance, such as shampooing the patient’s hair, that the couple noticed the most.
“You went above and beyond what you were asked to do,” the patient’s wife, Donna, told Redpoint personnel from her husband’s bedside in Rome.