The Plan:
We are two couples, best of friends for 30+ years, off to Switzerland for a hiking holiday in the Lauterbrunnen Valley. Left Labor Day weekend from ATL to Zurich, then direct to Lucerne by train. Two nights in Lucerne for Mt Pilatus and the city sights, then to Murren for a week at their most special two bedroom suite with a view at the Hotel Eiger. (We were celebrating 101 anniversary years in August between the four or us, and this was to be a higher-end luxury kind of trip than our usual!) Guys were heading home after this week and my friend and I were staying on another week in Lausanne, Zermatt, and Bern.
The Reality:
Direct flight on Delta. (Allow extra time to buy the rail passes in Zurich; super busy rail office.) Postcard blue skies for train ride to Lucerne. Checked in to The Bed and Breakfast - charming, easy city bus ride direct to the center, would stay here again. Fun lunch on Lucerne’s riverfront at Rathaus Brauerei. (We’ve been in Luzern about 2 hrs.) Crossed over the river, planning to turn left and walk through the flower-bedecked Kapellbrücke. But there’s a lovely double-domed church to our right, the Jesuit Church. The church has a small step up to the center aisle, and my husband did not see it. New Hokas with super tread for hiking stuck one foot to the marble floor while the rest of him went airborne. Kaboom. Left knee will not lift.
A city of Lucerne tour guide was leading a group in the church and called an ambulance to take him to the large teaching hospital in Lucerne. Diagnosis: Complete tear of quadriceps tendon from kneecap.
Surgery required. Do we stay or do we try to get home? We’ve been in the ER for hours. I was a trauma nurse in my past life, but am now at the hour 40 mark with about two hours sleep. We’re staying on the second floor of a hotel with a curving wooden staircase and no lift; our flight home is from another city, and it’s only direct to ATL three days a week.
I generally like teaching hospitals because of the layers of oversight, and we’ve been treated with kindness and general competence (if not with a great sense of urgency) but in a foreign system it’s difficult to discern rank. I know I’ve not dealt with any Attendings, but have been assured by various residents that an Attending will definitely supervise the surgery. Weighing the chance of a further injury if he should fall again, nearing midnight, running on fumes, we make the decision to stay in Switzerland for the surgery, which they hope to schedule tomorrow.
The Hospital:
The Luzerner Kantonspittal was extremely clean, well-staffed, not air-conditioned, and had only one available bed - on the cardiac post-op floor. Virtually all the doctors and nurses spoke competent English; technicians and support staff less so. At 5 PM, two hours after arrival, I was directed to the business office to make a 2000 CHF payment to cover expenses so far. We have our usual AMEX travel insurance underwritten by AMEX Assurance Company, but the hospital only reimburses.
Surgery the next day, Tuesday, was pronounced successful. Pain was well-controlled and PT started him on a perpetual motion device and got him walking on crutches.
Grateful our friends were here for the two worst first days, and to move me to another hotel after my reservation ran out and there was no more room at that inn! They’ll send us pictures from the mountains, and we’ll plan another trip.