Aspirus St. Luke's Hospital - Emergency Department - Duluth, Minnesota

Ericka R.

The Quality of care at this place has seriously gone down hill at this place it makes me sick. I went in the other night due to debilitating pain in my back and ribs . I got there at 8:45 and waited in the waiting room for an hour no big deal to me you expect a wait when going to the ER and they where able to do labs and urine because getting in a room. What was my last straw for me was when I got in a room and waited two hours for a doctor to come in at this point it’s after 11. when he finally came in he did not even look at the results of all the tests he ran . So he told me to give him a minute and he would come back with them and see what we could do. The test results had been in my patient portal since 10:15 . Why did he not look prior to coming in the room . I waited another hour before getting up and leaving .

emily W.

Very disappointed. They used to provide such good care for their patients. Went in for pain and a fever of 101.9 I went in and they couldn't find anything wrong- clean labs, not covid, rsv or the flu. That was after a 4hr wait. They prescribed some pain meds and antinausea meds. Told me to come back if it got worse. Took the meds, and even with the meds, Tylenol, ibuprofen and an ice pack I was still in pain and my fever went up to 103. So I went back in. Not as long of a wait this time maybe half hour to an hour. They ran the same exact tests, got the same results. They gave me some ibuprofen and it didn't help. They prescribed me 2 ambien for home and despite me being in excruciating pain, and running a fever, they sent me home. What happened to patient centered care? This was heartbreaking for me as they have always been my first choice.

T. K.

I had an excellent experience at the St. Luke ER! The system is efficient. The staff is helpful and skilled and, best of all, happy! Dr. Cameron Johnson and his team were accommodating, genuinely concerned about me, professional in every way and quickly earned my confidence, trust and respect. I am from out of state but was accompanied by my daughter who is a health professional at Essentia. Even she was impressed and highly pleased with St. Luke. I want to thank and publicly recognize the efforts of those working in St. Luke's ED. You all do an amazing job and made my experience as smooth and "painless" as possible. The Duluth community can be thankful for a facility with this level of care and service.

Opal B.

Went to the st Luke’s emergency room June 14th. After leaving there that day the father of my child received a phone call from a friend stating that this girl we had gone to school with had called him saying that I was just in the ER and that I was 6-8 weeks pregnant. Mind you only myself, my mother, and the father of my child knew about this pregnancy. This was not the first time I’ve been in the ER for severe dehydration due to pregnancy symptoms. Not only did I not even have an official obgyn appointment at this time and didn’t know exactly how far along I was nobody knew of this pregnancy other than the scribe who was working and the doctors and nurse who saw me. I was asked to guess about how far along I was at the time of registration and duration of the visit. This estimate of about 6-8 weeks was only ever mentioned in the ER that night. The father of my child was even surprised to hear that I was that far along(again we didn’t even know it was guess). We had found out from the friend who called to inform us that the scribe Trinity Benton had told the girl whom called my reasons for this visits to the ER WORD FOR WORD. I filed a complaint as that is very much so a hippa violation. St Luke’s support team claims they investigated and their was no privacy violation when there in fact was. I went to high school with this scribe as well as the girl she told my medical information to. They are both mutual friends on facebook and trinity’s place of work (scribe at st Luke’s emergency department) was also listed on her facebook. Surely the did not investigate to the fullest extent. For those of you who don’t know scribes have access to patients charts to better help the doctors throughout your visit. She was one of the only ones who had access to my medical information. If she is not further looked into and fired from her position we will be suing the hospital. Your scribe will be put on blast for disregarding my hippa privacy rights. I had to cancel my pregnancy announcement I had planned because of this scribe sharing this information with a girl (who I also went to school with) who then told several more people about my pregnancy. Which we were not planning to announce even remotely soon but were forced to do so.

Mellisa T.

I'm quite appalled at the downgrade in the quality of care recently within the hospital as a whole, but Especially the emergency room department. I went in this evening to be seen regarding an illness. I was very fatigued, running a fever, and needed specific tests ran. The wait was very short within 5 minutes of me sitting down and being registered, I was called to triage, when going into triage I bypassed the scale and sat down. The triage nurse at that point told me to get on the scale and I just stated my weight. I told the triage nurse, Tim, young kid, that "I'm not going to get on the scale but my weight was" .. such-and-such, again repeating the number I gave him in the beginning after he became upset. He continued to tell me that he could not move forward with triaging me without obtaining my weight. I should not have had to explain this part to him but I did anyways, because as a patient I have a right to refuse being weighed. There is no scientific study stating that it is going to improve the care or my health, first. Second, I would not be receiving any blood thinners, insulin, vancomycin or anesthesia. Those would be the medications that would require a weight and there is a sliding scale that that could go off of and regardless I know my weight and its in my chart. My most current weight was listed and it was not that long ago (weeks), moving on .... I explained to him that I have been under the care of a trusted provider that I do my scheduled consented weigh ins with. Because I am on a journey with my weight that has helped me overcome an eating disorder and being weighed hinders my mental health because of my history. It also states in my medical chart that I I'm not to be weighed, whether or not they have access to it, I gave my answer and it did not require any further explanation and it was a complete sentence. Now, this time that this occurred this person decided they were going to argue with me and then give me false statements stating that they would get in trouble if they wrote "patient stated" instead of actually weighing me. Btw, the machine does not connect to the computer. So one way or another, they're typing the number in. This also happened the last time that I was there in the emergency department. However, that time after arguing with me, the triage nurse finally just typed it in and wrote "pt stated". I choose to go to St Luke's hospital for my care and I pay for my care. And when I am sick im in need of that empathy and that quality care. Instead, I have a triage nurse who is lying to me. And arguing with me, an ill patient , over a weight that they've received immediately upon me walking into the door. I have a call in for the patient advocate. And I will be filing a grievance against this gentleman, based on the reviews im not optimistic that it will change anythig. At this point, there are so many other things that have occurred, the way that doctors speak to you and treat you when you come in. Being told that "these are not emergency room issues" to go see your doctor but then, when you call the doctor they can't get you in for 6 to 9 months and they tell you to go be seen in ER, you have nurses that are, for some reason, extremely irritated, and they take that out on the patients in the room. They give false information to their patients. It is a good thing that I have the medical history and knowledge that I do as somebody who has worked in the medical field for a majority of their life, because if I didn't and I wasn't capable of advocating for myself, I can imagine how things would go. And I don't think that everyone that comes in there should have to know what I know in order to be treated fairly and get the best quality of care. It should never be something that's triggering for anyone, or cause fear to go seek medical help because they're afraid of how they're going to be treated. At this point I would rather chew off my own leg than to visit St Luke's ER in my time of need. So today I left and I drove to Essentia.

Blake M.

Worst ER of my life and I am sitting in the waiting room right now. I came in with a KIDNEY INFECTION after the antibiotics weren’t working. That’s pretty serious as they mentioned surgery as soon as I walked in. So why am I sitting in the waiting room, not being seen for 3 hours while everyone else in the waiting room got seen. EVERY OTHER PERSON. Do not come here, there is an essentia right down the road that will be 1000x better.

Jayme R.

My SO was having chest pain, literally all symptoms of a heart attack. Got vitals, EKG "normal", had to wait in the lobby. Had an Xray, 4 hours later we have no answers. It should have been a quick find and possible fix.

We witnessed the staff behave carelessly towards an elderly woman in a wheel chair. The daughter was concerned on her well being and said he mom was getting worse, staff only shrugged.

Heart attack, stroke, whatever your aliment don't come here. They do not care.
You'll die waiting.

Hailey G.

The only ones who figured out I had a fungly infected kidney stone when I was pregnant. Saved me and my babies life.
Although I will say there was a very rude old lady who treated me extremely poorly after I had my daughter, the day after. Who works in O.B. she should definitely be fired. Keep this hospital one of the good ones.