On June 29, after attending the morning service at West McComb Baptist Church and eating lunch, I experienced a pain that I thought was a kidney stone passing. In reality it was two stones that had blocked both of the tubes from my kidney, and the death clock was ticking.
My daughter, nurse practitioner Kim LeMaster, took me to Southwest Mississippi Regional Medical Center, and we sat in the waiting about two hours before I was seen. By that time, my blood pressure bottomed out, and the doctor decided to send me to Baptist in Jackson by helicopter.
The only problem was both helicopters were out on a call. Finally one came in. and the crew strapped me to a stretcher and put me in, next to the pilot.
When we arrived at Baptist, a urologist was waiting, and they took me right on to the operating room.
He got the stones off the two tubes and told me later that when I got to Baptist, I had one hour to live.
I spent seven days there recuperating.
The helicopter bill was $74,529, which the Veterans Administration paid even though Pike County pays a yearly fee to cover all residents of the county.
How much plainer could county supervisors have been? We are covered for helicopter evacuations. Yet the air ambulance billed VA the $74,529, which VA paid.
— Robert LeMaster, Summit
