Hospital regulations require a wheelchair for patients being discharged.
However, while working as a student nurse, I found an elderly man already dressed and sitting on the bed with a suitcase at his feet – who insisted he didn’t need my help to leave the hospital.
After a chat about the rules, he reluctantly let me wheel him to the elevator.
On the way down, I asked if his wife was meeting him.
“I don’t know,” he said, “She’s still upstairs in the bathroom changing out of her hospital gown.”