If you had been following me for a while now, I have always stated I never liked Fridays. For some reasons, things tends to go super wrong during Fridays. We still get a lot of our patients, especially in the mornings, but Fridays are often the worst. Where to start?
Difficult patients are always a challenge, not to mention mentally draining. There's this man who always brings his son to the hospital. We know him very well, he had seen every surgeons we have, and always telling everyone: "My son has a wound." All of us had seen him before and the son, and there is no wound. He had healed a long time ago, but the father kept insisting: "No, I tell you my son has a wound." This reminds me of something that I read in a novel... (I'm not going to tell you what novel it is, I could get in trouble for it) The surgeons, every one of us checked him. There is no wound, no tear, nothing. The father also make demands. "Which room are you bringing my son into?" "Why does your doctor takes so long?" "Is that Chinese nurse around? I want her to attend my son." There was one time he wanted dressing sets for the dressing (I'm going to keep stressing here, no wound!), I advised him in a gentle tone, "Are you really sure you want them?" I was trying to give him a hint that he doesn't need so much dressing sets, maybe one or two. Nope, he wanted a week's supply. I can't force him not to buy so I ended up selling him those. He came back few weeks later, telling me that he wants to return some of the supply. Unfortunately, once purchased, considered sold. He wasn't happy and told the surgeon on how I was being bad-hearted. The surgeon's answer: "Why did you buy so many in the first place?" He was so furious with all of us he ended up going to another surgeon, with the same reason: "My son has a wound..." Oh God.
This is a story I heard from my friend. She once had a patient who took a six-month medical leave. She didn't go into too much details, but she did asked repeatedly. "Are you absolutely sure you can take six-month leave?" The patient's answer: "Oh don't worry. My company allows me to. I'm entitled to take six months medical leave." She came back after a while, cursing my friend for causing her to lose a job because of her six-month medical leave. The surgeon wouldn't put up with her attitude and told her off, and she never came back again. Okay, this part is a little bit debatable. I used to work for orthopaedists (bone doctors), and sometimes, in severe trauma cases, like spine problems or severe fractures, you can take long medical leaves, depending on the severity of the condition, and depending on your company/ insurance policy. I'm no insurance expert, but this is why I often stressed to patients, please check with your insurance agent/ Human Resources/ Management etc etc on your policy/ entitlements/ rights. Regarding six-month medical leaves, doctors would usually write an accompanying letter on why does the patient needs it. (MC entitlement varies upon your company so please be careful.)
There is this old man who has an appointment with the specialist. He's really frail, and in my heart, I have the feeling that he won't last wrong. He's okay, I just needed to support him, the wife helped. What I couldn't stand was the daughter. While I was helping the man, the daughter launched into a whole rant, about how our service were bad, our nurses don't know anything, like what??? Once I made sure he was comfortable, I went to the assistant and found out:
- The man came though the emergency department, with difficulty in breathing (No shortness of breath when he came to me, thank God), but the major complaint was his nephrostomy tube was dislodged. (Not fully, but it's still bad)
- In emergency, the family were advised to get the man in for admission, but the daughter demanded to see our specialist first.
- When she came up, she went on a rant (as mentioned above)
- This wasn't the first time she does this. According to the assistant, she tends to drop in without warning and make a fuss when the file doesn't arrive (I'm going to say it right here and now. You can drop in anytime to see a specialist, but when you drop in as a last minute walk-in appointment, your file tends to take time to get to the clinic. For new patients, it's not a big issue, we mainly just need to file in all the loose notes for record-keeping, but for old patients, doctors needed your old records so that they can remember the previous treatment)
- The man was so frail, I didn't dare to leave him alone too long. (In between running after other patients and procedures, I pop in to make sure that he's still breathing, sometimes I tucked the blanket around to make sure that I can see him react (Not shocking him or anything. I will ask him ever half an hour on how is he. He can talk a little, but you can see that it takes a lot out of him, so I tuck the blanket, it gives me an excuse to see that his chest is rise and falling, and his pulse is visible on his wrists. You could see the pulse beating...He is so skinny) Seriously, he could just go off anytime and I'm really scared)
- The family had a long discussion while the man was resting in the room. Once out, the daughter asked me to call the head of the ward. (I didn't stick around because I was busy running after patients, but judging from her character....You know, I won't speculate.)
- I pitied the man so much that when the specialist said admit him through Emergency, to spare him the torture, I suggested to move him by bed, which is the best option, and thank God the daughter did not disagree.
Source: Cactuar - Jumbo Cactuar Attacks
