Was your OOS college student ever hospitalized?

[Anonymous]

I'm wondering what happens if your college student is far from home and needs to be hospitalized.
Did anyone's student experience that? What did you do? Were they able to handle it on their own/with the help of friends or the college? Did you have the ability to fly out there and be with them?

[Anonymous]

Everyone I know who had a child hospitalized at school at least one parent flew to be with them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Everyone I know who had a child hospitalized at school at least one parent flew to be with them.

I will add, the vast majority were sons who had their appendix removed.

[Anonymous]

I went to college almost 1500 miles from home, back in the pre-internet days. I was never hospitalized, nor do I remember any of my friends (many of them also out-of-state) being hospitalized.

My child is now at a college 1000 miles from home. There is an active parent facebook group, where parents occasionally ask for advice about medical specialists in the area, and they get good responses. Very rarely a parent talks about a more serious issue, for which they might visit. The vast majority of the time, parents are visiting for fun reasons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone I know who had a child hospitalized at school at least one parent flew to be with them.

I will add, the vast majority were sons who had their appendix removed.

How many do you know of? Are you in some kind of professional position where you interact with college aged students with health care problems?

(I only know of one case personally - student had bad food poisoning that worsened before they finally figured it out, I think)

[Anonymous]

I was. My parents drove up and made it in record time.

I'd drive/fly out, no question. Don't expect friends to take care of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone I know who had a child hospitalized at school at least one parent flew to be with them.

I will add, the vast majority were sons who had their appendix removed.

How many do you know of? Are you in some kind of professional position where you interact with college aged students with health care problems?

(I only know of one case personally - student had bad food poisoning that worsened before they finally figured it out, I think)

Four appendicitis, one (known) eating disorder re-emerging, and one burned themselves when cooking. In all cases the mom went, in the case of the burn victim both parents went for several weeks.

Just hearing through grapevines of friends. One was a nephew. I have boys and tend to know more boy moms, so maybe that is why it skews toward appendicitis.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone I know who had a child hospitalized at school at least one parent flew to be with them.

I will add, the vast majority were sons who had their appendix removed.

How many do you know of? Are you in some kind of professional position where you interact with college aged students with health care problems?

(I only know of one case personally - student had bad food poisoning that worsened before they finally figured it out, I think)

Four appendicitis, one (known) eating disorder re-emerging, and one burned themselves when cooking. In all cases the mom went, in the case of the burn victim both parents went for several weeks.

Just hearing through grapevines of friends. One was a nephew. I have boys and tend to know more boy moms, so maybe that is why it skews toward appendicitis.

My husband (then boyfriend) had an emergency appendectomy his first year of law school. I took him to the hospital and he called his parents before going into surgery. They were a 4 hour drive away and came right away.

[Anonymous]

I was hospitalized in college once. The first time I had turned 18 a few weeks before and had never even been to a doctor alone. It was eye opening to be alone in an ER but I managed well (a dean from the college came to visit even though I was never admitted and stayed less than 8 hours). I don’t remember how I got home (this was pre Uber), but I got back to my dorm. I found a ride to a follow up appointment a few days later too even though I was a freshman and freshmen weren’t allowed cars.

I handled it. I was scared but so proud to do it myself - made me feel capable despite the injury. And hallmarks helped a lot with things like doing my hair that I couldn’t do - even though we had met only eight weeks ago. Having my mom there would have been WEIRD AF.

[Anonymous]

If my child was hospitalized I would go, no question. People in the hospital often need a advocate. However well intentioned the average college student has no experience with that and their friend group would likely be very inadequate.

[Anonymous]

I think the answer to what to do is also different if a kid is hospitalized at his/her university’s hospital rather than some random unaffiliated facility. At the former, it’s likely to be about as good a hospitalization experience as you can ask for and your child’s relevant adviser or whatever is likely to be automatically notified with their consent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If my child was hospitalized I would go, no question. People in the hospital often need a advocate. However well intentioned the average college student has no experience with that and their friend group would likely be very inadequate.

NP. This is an excellent point. From experience I know that even adults who are able to communicate OK while ill or injured still do need someone with them to listen to the doctors, ask questions and be an advocate. And while my DD has a terrific, intelligent group of very devoted friends at college, I would not expect any of them to take that on, nor would I think any of them would have the life experience to know what to ask and when to get assertive with doctors etc. (For context, DD is at a college a six-hour drive from us; flying would actually take longer by the time we got to and from airports on each end, got a rental car to get to her, etc. So we would drive if needed.)

OP, are you concerned about your own kid going off to college next year and what might happen in the event your kid was hospitalized? Or does your kid have any specific condition that could land them in the hospital so you're worried? If you have specific questions around that, let us know and I'm sure you'll get some good input here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
OP, are you concerned about your own kid going off to college next year and what might happen in the event your kid was hospitalized? Or does your kid have any specific condition that could land them in the hospital so you're worried? If you have specific questions around that, let us know and I'm sure you'll get some good input here.

I was wondering how frequently it happens...

My situation is that it is extremely, extremely difficult for me to leave home overnight and would be even harder for me to leave for more than one day. So if my child goes away to school (or anywhere for that matter) and is hospitalized, it would be very difficult for me to just drop everything and fly there.

I am contemplating buying membership in something like MedJet to fly them home in such an emergency, therefore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
OP, are you concerned about your own kid going off to college next year and what might happen in the event your kid was hospitalized? Or does your kid have any specific condition that could land them in the hospital so you're worried? If you have specific questions around that, let us know and I'm sure you'll get some good input here.

I was wondering how frequently it happens...

My situation is that it is extremely, extremely difficult for me to leave home overnight and would be even harder for me to leave for more than one day. So if my child goes away to school (or anywhere for that matter) and is hospitalized, it would be very difficult for me to just drop everything and fly there.

I am contemplating buying membership in something like MedJet to fly them home in such an emergency, therefore.

The alternative is to work your network to find local friends of friends-of-friends that could step in. I have been this contact for two kids at AU, neither needed me in the hospital, but I did have grab room stuff for one upon Covid rapid move out. My kid is now in Champaign, IL and a fried hooked me up with a college friend of hers that lives there locally. Probably won’t need her, but I met her at move-in weekend for coffee and I would call her if needed.

[Anonymous]

My DS is on the west coast. He was in a bad scooter accident on campus. His friends and the student health center took care of him until it was clear he needed major surgery. They got him to the university hospital and I arrived as he got out of surgery. We were in constant contact with the doctor at the student health center.