Celebrities' special health care? Not so much

Caring for a sick celebrity in the hospital offers unique challenges. Fame and fortune bring VIPs great benefits but also some significant problems.
First and foremost, there are issues of patient confidentiality. For this reason, I won't discuss specific examples; suffice it to say that being a well-known VIP at a hospital is no guarantee of receiving excellent care. In fact, it can lead to worse health care.
To many hospitals, having a VIP patient is a sign of prestige and honor. Often, the hospital's name is mentioned in the press: "Mr. X has been diagnosed with cancer of the colon and is now receiving treatment at the John Doe Memorial Hospital." Most readers assume that, given Mr. X's fame and wealth, he could choose any hospital he believed would offer the best care. Since he's at John Doe Memorial Hospital, it must be a darned good hospital. It follows that they might feel that, when they get sick, they also want to go there.
Hospitals love this type of public relations, but there are downsides to VIPs.
Once Mr. X is admitted to the hospital, it becomes a large burden for hospital administrators to respect and assure his privacy and confidentiality. The media are everywhere, and they are sneaky. They are assigned a story, and they need details.
Among the medical staff, word spreads that Mr. X is a patient on 8 North. Each time the doctor orders a test or procedure down in X-ray or surgery, many staff members try to find an excuse to walk by and gaze at the famous Mr. X as he rests on the hospital gurney awaiting his scan. Of course, other patients recognize Mr. X, and they want to talk with him or wish him well.
VIPs often are admitted to special rooms or sections reserved for the elite after their procedures. These wards are often beautifully decorated with large private rooms, provide special foods and offer boutique services. They are staffed by nurses specially trained to respect privacy and deal with the complexities of VIPs and their families.
While these special staff are lovely people and have outstanding bedside manners, they are not always as skilled at managing medical crises as are the floor nurses who deal daily with complex medical situations.
As such, I've seen VIPs go for hours with undiagnosed bleeding ulcers, untreated pain or unusual cardiac arrhythmias – all conditions that would be quickly detected on the wards where the masses reside, where patients often share a room and the nurses are overworked but pop into each room on a very regular basis.
Doctors seem to regularly over-order tests on VIPs, which places these sick people at risk for unnecessary complications and an increased chance of a test result being wrong. Senior doctors often request that interns and residents stay away from their VIPs in an attempt to protect the VIP from bother, aggravation and breaches of privacy. However, without junior doctors regularly looking in on a patient several times each day, VIPs need to rely on their senior doctor, who may stop by only once or twice each day.
When something does go wrong – and for sick people in hospitals, things happen on a regular basis – and the senior doctor isn't immediately available, the nurses are forced to call a medical resident. The resident is now forced to provide care for the VIP without any knowledge of Mr. X or his medical condition, allergies, prior treatments and the like.
Regardless, we love our celebrities and we want to give them special care – it's just that special care isn't always the best care that you and I receive. Maybe we ought to just treat everyone with the same excellent care and not work to provide special services for VIPs.