Seriously, how is it that some “health care professionals” can be so slow?

I was in a class today that took up 4 hours of my life teaching the cardiac conduction system. When asked “are you sure you haven’t taken this class” (twice), the answer in my head was “like monkeys we can use tools, and one of those tools is a book, which one can pick up and read, making them privy to a world of new information, including the things you are teaching in this so called class”. But in the interest of being professional I simply smiled and said I had some time to read up on it.

Anyhow, taking several mini classes including ACLS and PALS because I am “going to confuse those in the BLS renewal class”. It is nice to see how my science education ties into my medical education. By the end of the summer I should have a good amount of new credentials.

Fun fact for the day, my “most searched” topic is “good poop“, which is slightly less amusing than “VIP spanking” which was last weeks favorite (and I am really not sure how that happened).

Also I wound up a patient in my own damn ER. Seriously. And lemme tell ya, I did not want to be there, AND I found out that one of our ER docs charted what he wanted to chart (including the opposite answer to my questions, and a physical exam that wasn’t preformed).  Horrible headache and neck stiffness, you better believe I would have gotten an LP before sending MY patient home with scripts to treat a “neck sprain”. Gross oversight buddy, especially since the incidence of meningitis has been so high lately. And seriously don’t give me a funny look when I refuse narcotics, I don’t like the way they make me feel and more often than not a prescription dose of some random NSAIDs do the trick.

perspective is nice.

Getting an A in physics does not a good doctor make, but compassion and altruism, that my friend is what really matters.

more later.

I love my dog.

He is by far the weirdest little dog I have ever seen.

Currently he is chasing his left back foot, not his tail, his foot, he can catch his tail, the foot, however seems to have some extra specialness due to its constant vertical and horizontal movement.

He barks at a mocking bird that lives outside of our house, the bird barks back.

His favorite foods include: pineapple, dirt, rocks occasionally, cat food, bread, bananas, peanut butter and any peanut butter constituents, my shoes, the cats butt, my socks and cigarette butts*

He is afraid of balloons, men with dark hair, other small dogs (but not big ones) and the nerf gun Mr. Engineer got for his birthday.

*please note, we are not bad parents, he is just faster than us.

Beep…… Beep…..

Son-of-a-bit….

Stupid call light. Stupid patient. No it is not time for your demerol, and if you hadn’t just eaten an entire bucket of fried chicken you wouldn’t need the phenergan.

“did you need something Dr. Peel?”

“it is not time for your pain medicine yet, I’ve looked at your MAR and you have nothing else for nausea for another hour, would you like me to bring you a sprite or an ice pack?”

“Alright I will let your nurse know that you would like to see her”

effing drug seekers, I don’t want to hear another person complaining.

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“I have a consult for OB/GYN on call, yes I will hold”

20 minutes later

“the patients name is “we didn’t know she was pregnant”, age is 23, room number is 555, consulting doc is general surgeon, and reason for consult, we didnt know she was pregnant, we caught it in the preop screening….”

“yes, I will hold”

“I’m sorry what did you need…… her method of payment…. where would I find that….. ok…. hold on…….. self pay….. what do you mean you aren’t on call…… really. fine, I will call the non-death-star group.”

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I felt ill.

“my spanish isn’t that good. I can’t tell this man he is dying and that you will not treat him because he doesn’t have a social security number”

find another interpreter.

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I hear screams down the hall. The anesthesiologist uses the call light to ask for help, she needs to be held down. He isn’t the gentlest, and it is apparent the lidocaine isn’t working, but she needs this central line and it is almost in.

I hold her arm down and coach her breathing. I ask her to tell me about her son, she disolves into more tears, she is hyperventilating.

Apparently she is missing a baseball game.

She has missed a lot of baseball games, mostly due to her paralysis and her repeated hospital visits.

I pray with her, she calms down, stops hyperventilating, the anesthesiologist thanks me for my help and I resume my place next to the monitors and the call light.

Beep….. Beep…….

I feel my face getting hot, my ears red, I wish this damn patient would leave the call light alone, I have a lot to do other than remind her it isn’t time for her damn medicine, this is a hospital not a damn hilton.

Beep…. Beep……..

“did you need something?”

A quiet voice from the other end says “would you come down and pray with me again before you leave”

Oh my god.

I’ve managed to forget the fact that Dr. Peel, who had been on the call light every 2 minutes for the last 3 days was a person. A person who was hurting. Who came to us, wanting us to do something about it.

She may be annoying. A pain in the ass.

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I refuse to allow this business to make me cynical.

I refuse to allow the pitfalls of wanting to help people to discourage me from going after what I want to do.

So, insurance companies, drug seekers, long hours and general abuse, fuck you.

I refuse to let you keep me from helping people

Over the years I have learned that there are some things in medicine I do not want to mess with.

I am seriously considering going to chiropractic school. If I go, and hate my job, I could easily go back to school to get my MD.

It would eliminate the competition to get into medical school, a lot of the loans, 2 more years of school, and I would be able to have the lifestyle I want.

Any thoughts?

I must have pica because I ate an entire tin of wintergreen altoids while I was at work today.

I am pretty sure that in this quantity Altoids are not considered a food substance.

I am quite confident that this will give me an ulcer and combined with the stress of applying to medical school will lead to my demise.

All thanks to the only pill that lets me sleep.

When you (with your associates degree) proceed to attempt to degrade me (with my BS) you only make yourself look like an ass.

Don’t get me wrong, I value your experience, but no one, and I mean NO ONE, has the right to be condescending to anyone else. And please remember that I have quite a bit of experience myself.

It makes you look especially stupid when you try to disregard me because I do not posses certain letters behind my name, even though I have 3 more years of education than you do.

I am throwing Mr. Engineer an Iron Man party for his birthday. He doesn’t know it yet.

He is however, my super hero.

Happy Birthday Iron Man.

I get it, socialized health care = altruism.

Truth is it doesn’t work.

It is a harsh reality. One that I do not stomach well.

There seems to be 2 schools of thought.

The first being the altruistic one. The (possibly naive) idea that we can simply help people because they need help. Health care is a human right, and one that should not be denied under circumstances related to money.

The second being the business one. Simply put, health care is a service, it is self-propagating because health care is not a fundamental right or need.

Personally, I am all for altruism. I feel like if you have CHF, and you cannot breathe, and I have some power to stop that, than you as a human being deserve the lasix that will fix you. Because at that point in time nothing (including love, food, shelter ect.) is more of a need than the need to breathe. (not that socialized health care works)

But really, neither school of thought is accurate. In actuality, medicine is as much of a mix of emotional and logical as it is a mix of art and medicine.

Traditionally health care workers have a solid balance of emotional/logical, we have too just to get through the rigorous course work that earns us the right to work in the field.

So how much do our experiences weigh into our emotional/logical balance? And how can we regain that balance?

Why won’t socialized health care work? Because it lack the balance necessary to sustain itself.

Sorry for the lull. I’ve been just a little burnt lately. I have however decided some things that I will blog all about shortly.