It was 7:30am on the morning of May 15, 2015; I took my dad to his second cataract surgery at the Pasqua Hospital today and went to the Registration/Admission desk on the main floor to get the wrist band and paperwork printed:”; they were nice employees. The next step is to go up to the second floor over to Day Surgery desk and submit the paperwork and change into the hospital gown. The elderly lady that assisted us was so rude and used such an ignorant and condescending tone towards my dad and I. We had not said a word when we went upstairs except “hello” and she grabbed out paperwork from us.

When she was explaining the hospital gown instructions, she was super rude and spoke loudly and made us sound like we had not a damn clue what she was saying. My dad and I are Vietnamese but I was born and raised here and my dad speaks basic English, enough to understand her instructions AND he can even understand up to “car” talk. So needless to say, he has a decent understanding of the English language and she did not have to use that tone.

I initially thought she was just a cranky ignorant employee, but NO! The next few people she helped after Us she was being so nice and friendly. At that point I got a bit upset and realized she had acted mean towards us on purpose!!! I didn’t want to say anything and just let that incident go.

She then looked at the lineup at the reception desk and seen another Asian man standing in line (behind 2-4 other Caucasian people) and asked him if he was with us. I was so angry after that, it just showed that she was super ignorant and had the guts to ask another Asian man if he was with us when he was standing in line with his own registration paperwork in his hands!!!!!

It was then when my dad finished changing into his gown and had his clothes inside the plastic bag. Last few day surgeries we attended to, we were always instructed to put it into the locker and lock it up, but the old lady made us take the bag with us and she was ABSOLUTELY RUDE about it. I asked her why we can’t put it in the locker because we have been here for day surgery before and was ALWAYS told to put it in the locker; she had no response and ignored us and attended to someone else before finishing up with us.

She then started to walk away and then she stopped suddenly and told us to come with her. That was the last straw for me, I had enough of her being so rude and ignorant. I have never filed a complaint ever in my life, but this lady just showed so much ignorance and racism! I do not think an employee of the hospital should be treating patients this way – showing a lot of differences in how she treats her fellow Caucasian culture versus one of a different nationality. This is so absurd and hurtful!
Apparently this has happened many times before with hearing stories from my relatives and their friends, they just have not filed a complaint.

This needs to change! Upper management needs to take these racial profiling and ignorance issues at an urgent level because this is not okay!