Mission accomplish

Before I get started, I just want to give a big gold star to the front line workers at Ottawa Public Health's H1N1 flu shot clinics. From what I witnessed today, staff were all professional, calm and empathic while working in an environment of organized chaos. And what I say organized chaos, I don't mean it as a criticism. Having hundreds, if not thousands of people, line up for limited spots, many of whom could be a panicky and cranky, doesn't exactly lend itself to calm working conditions.

As I blogged yesterday, dear husband tried to get a wrist band for darling daughter. Unfortunately, he wasn't successful. He was about 100 people short of getting one. So early this morning we enacted Plan B. Plan B consisted of dear husband getting up at 3 a.m. and arriving at the flu clinic at 3:30 a.m. Mind you, wrist bands were being handed out at 7:30 a.m., with the clinic opening at 9 a.m. Arriving at 3:30 a.m. seemed a little extreme. However, I'd like to point out that dear husband wasn't the first to arrive. One person arrived at 2 a.m. to stake out a spot. Several people who had arrived in the early morning hours had been turned away at previous clinics in the week.

When we went over Plan B late last night, I thought we were a bit crazy. But according to dear husband, the line really started to grow around 4:30 a.m. So maybe weren't crazy after all.

I had my doubts about lining up and waiting for hours for a vaccination. But as the week has worn on, the line ups seem to be getting worse, not better. And while family physicians have been invited to apply for vaccine, it remains to be seen when that vaccine will be delivered and when those flu clinics will open. It could be days or it could be weeks. Who knows? And there are no guarantees the primary health clinic I'm a patient of will have a clinic. So we decided to bite the bullet and have dear husband get up early and line up.

Shortly after 7:30 a.m., dear husband called, saying was on his way to pick us up as we had to be at the clinic at 8 a.m. When we arrived, we were welcomed by a huge line up that snaked from outside and around the perimeter of the lobby. We waited for a good hour before our number was called and get darling daughter vaccinated. Once we were upstairs, it was smooth sailing. We handed in our papers and were led to a nurse who administrated the vaccination. Darling daughter didn't even cry. After waiting 15 minutes as recommended by public health officials, we were done.

Three weeks from now, we'll have to do it all over again as darling daughter only got half of her vaccination dose today. Hopefully the line ups will have died down a bit. If not, dear husband is willing to get up at 3 a.m. again.