10/30/2003: An anonymous contributor shares a first-hand account of seeing a mysterious man in the hospital’s pharmacy while working the graveyard shift. Their experience was confirmed when later talking to co-workers about strange experiences and realizing they had all seen the same ghostly figure.
I worked in the pharmacy at Mount Carmel East Hospital for three years as a technician. I worked most day and evening shifts but also spent several weekends on the graveyard shift. I had never heard anyone speak of ghosts or apparitions within the department, so when I first had my encounter, I was uncertain I should tell anyone. On several occasions, when I was alone in the department, I saw, just briefly out of the corner of my eye, someone walk by on the other side of the room. Several times, while working in the IV prep room, behind a closed automated sliding glass door, I would see someone walk past the door just outside. After stepping out of the room, I checked the pharmacy, but I was alone. I attributed it all as a figment of my imagination and ignored each occurrence. I was so used to seeing people in white lab coats walk by, maybe I was just seeing them unconsciously as well.
One night, while working third shift, the pharmacist was called away to the ER for an incoming trauma. I was left alone again in the pharmacy to field calls from the nursing units and to continue filling prescriptions. After about an hour, all the work was done and I sat down to do some studying. After a few minutes, I felt someone walk past from behind. I turned, but no one was there. Later after the pharmacist returned, I got up and began working on the med bins in one section of the pharmacy. From where I was standing, I could see through a small sliding glass window into the IV prep room and through the automated door to that room (the window and door are on the opposite sides of the same corner of the room). As I glanced up, I saw a man with light reddish hair, wearing a lab coat and carrying what looked like a piece of paper, walk through the door. He was staring intently at the paper in his hands, and very briefly looked up directly at me. He seemed to really take no notice of me more than anyone would take notice of someone they passed in the hallway. Then he looked back down at his paper and walked through.
I saw the apparition several more times within the next few months but never mentioned anything about it until one evening shift where two pharmacists, myself, and another technician began telling each other about strange things that had happened to us. To my surprise, one pharmacist, who had been at the hospital since it was first built, started talking about a ‘ghost pharmacist’ that she and other had seen on several occasions, walking through the pharmacy with his head down, reading something off a piece of paper. She described the ghost exactly as I have and said she never sees him but for a second and usually only catches a glimpse of him when she is alone in the pharmacy and only out the corner of her eye. The other pharmacist admitted that she had seen the same thing on several occasions when by herself. It was only then that I told anyone of my experiences and they were obviously not surprised by them. The strange thing is, no one recognizes this person. He’s not a former pharmacist and to anyone’s knowledge, not a former doctor. But he is for the most part not threatening and simply goes about his work quietly and studiously.