Are there any nice drs?

TheCommuter, BSN, RN · Nov 28, 2007

I can only tell you about my personal experiences with doctors. I would say that the majority of the ones I've personally dealt with, about 2/3 of them, are either pleasant or even-tempered. The remaining 1/3 are, in my opinion, mean-spirited jerks who look down upon nurses. However, we naturally tend to focus more of our attention on the negative doctors. The handwriting interpretation will come with the passage of time, although I think that all healthcare professionals should have a legal obligation to write in a legible manner.

LeesieBug · Nov 28, 2007

NONE of the doctors I work with on a regular basis are rude or disrespectful...like any other group of people, they all have their quirks, which after time you get to know and understand.

Some of them even buy us pizza or sundaes (aka health food)sometimes on busy nights.:kiss

While there may be a few I don't like personally, no one wanders around shouting at me or treating me like crap. I really do think those types are the exception to the rule, and it tends to happen in places where it is tolerated...in my workplace it is not tolerated.

Handwriting varies....one nice thing in the ER, if I can't read it I just walk up to them and ask them to translate!

allnurses Guide · Nov 28, 2007

99% of the docs I've worked with have been great.

Handwriting on the otherhand . . . it is sort of like learning a second language when you first start. But then you can read it fine.

It would save time if it was typed.

steph

al7139, ASN, RN · Nov 28, 2007

I have been a nurse for about 6 months now. I have found that the MD's who have the worst reputations are really not so bad. This is because I don't let them intimidate me. Mabye I am lucky I have a "strong" personality, but even the docs that scare other nurses I get along with fine.

I always make sure that if I have to call a doc after hours, that I have all my facts, so I am not scrambling (i.e. problem, vitals, my assessment, etc.), I will also go to my coworkers first in some cases, to get their opinion, and what they would do. I am also always polite, and will always say to them "Hi Dr so and so, I am sorry to call so late, but your pt (name, room #, with a diagnosis of such and such) is ...do you have any ideas, orders, etc?" Even if they don't give me orders, I always thank them. I also make sure to greet them if I see them on the unit, and will even joke around with them. I am not brown nosing, but if I have to have a working relationship with them, it is harder for them to be obnoxious if they know who I am. I even had another nurse comment after I called a doc in the wee hours of the morning (fearsome reputation for bein nasty) after telemetry alerted me to an abnormal rhythm. I asked him if he had any orders, he said no, then jokingly said the best way to treat the arrhythmis was to turn off the monitor. I laughed and said I couldn't do that, but that he could give me some parameters, so we were not calling him every hour (the pt was going in and out of v-tach, but we were already doing all we could), so he did, and the other nurse said that she is envious of how I talk to them. Show the docs some spine, and they will respect you all the more.

I you do happen to have a bad experience, don't take it personally. Remember, as much as we feel overworked, the Docs are even more so (they see and care for many more patients than we do!).

Amy

Sabby_NC · Nov 28, 2007

For sure there are and I even like the grumpy ones. LOL

Like anyone it is how you treat them and get treated in return.

I have to say the hospital I worked in before coming here was the best place and all the Docs were fabulous.

Just remember we all have bad days.

If you have an experience with a Doctor that was not pleasant or you get your head bitten off, address it with them in a professional manner. They will respect you for that and apologize for their behavior.

I prefer to have things dealt with at the time and if I have an experience that was less than professional I request to speak with the Doctor concerned at the time, in private. Discuss the issue and get it resolved. Works for me.

I had a Neurosurgeon bite my head off in front of a patient.

He ordered something to be done the evening before but it was not. He had a legitimate complaint but he delivered it in a very unprofessional way. Now he was 6'6" and I am 5' tall.

I requested to speak with him outside the ICU.

I took him out there and discussed this with him. Tell him I am a professional and did not deserve that tirade. I told him he had a legit complaint, I will follow it through and phone him back with answers as to why this order was not carried out.

He apologized, I did as I said and we became good friends and professionally respected each other in our work.

Yup there are defo Great Docs out there :)

jmgrn65, RN · Nov 28, 2007

My big concern when I become an RN (eventually, don't know when) is the doctors. Are they mean/jerky at all? Do they take the RN's advice into consideration, and can you read their handwriting? lol
Thanks to all!!

Yes I think the majority are nice, and some are mean/jerky just like some people are nice and some are jerky.

Handwriting is not always readable but usually someone can read handwriting sometimes it takes 3 or 4 of us to stand over the chart and try to figure out what the doctor wrote.:uhoh21:

Usually as a nurse you will learn how to word thing differently to the doc so you aren't advising. Some docs want it to be thier idea. :idea:

Pediatric Critical Care Columnist · Nov 28, 2007

Some of the best docs I've ever worked with were nurses first. Like the trauma surgeon who used to come into the ICU every single day to do a dressing change herself because it was complex and difficult and she didn't want the nurse to have to try and do it while was also having to do several other things. AND she collected up all of her own supplies and cleaned up all of her own mess. Definitely a special person. I only ever say her raise her voice once, and it was at another doc!! Of course, none of that helps her handwriting. It's like trying to read shorthand in German...

Same unit had one of those docs from Hades. You know the kind - the ones everybody quakes in fear of. She had to have apersonality disorder, because she'd be absolutely fine one minute and a red-faced, screaming monster the next over something as simple as the choice of words the person used. Once in rounds she was carrying on a conversation with someone else while I waited to present on my burn patient. While she was busy, I was chatting quietly with one of the residents who had asked me if the kid was going to the OR that day. I told him that I'd spoken to Dr. M already and that he said they'd take the kid later that day for debridement and grafting. She only caught the end of the conversation and jumped in with, "He? He WHO?!! He could be anybody! HE could be ortho, he could be plastics, he could be ENT! HE WHO?!!" Her face was red and her eyes were practically bulging. I turned to her and said sweetly, "Actually I was talking to Jim. He asked me a question and I was answering it. But if you must know before I get there in my report, it was Dr. M that I spoke to this morning. He has time on his slate so plastics will tag team with him this afternoon." Her face got even redder, the veins in her neck stood out like rope and I thought her eyes were literally going to fall out. But she backed off and never did that to me again. The people she bullied were the ones who never stood up to her, the ones who were obviously afraid of her. I had already known her for 10 years by then and remembered her as a resident, so she didn't scare me at all. I think that's the secret. Let them know you won't be bullied, and they won't.

allnurses Guide · Nov 28, 2007

"i think that's the secret. let them know you won't be bullied, and they won't." (janfrn)

:yeahthat:

Daytonite, BSN, RN · Nov 28, 2007

OMG, yes! They are much better than they were 30 years ago! My oncologist is the sweetest and most patient man on the face of the earth. One day in his office I stood by and listened to him give admission orders to a hospital nurse who I could only guess didn't speak very good English for 10 minutes while I waited for him to give me my take home instructions. He repeated his orders not only once, but 3 times in a calm, even voice and never made a comment to anyone about the nurse. I judged her a dummy after he asked her to repeat the orders back and said, "No, let me repeat them for you again and went very slowly and even spelled some of the drugs on the third go around. What a saint.

When I worked in a large teaching facility I found that most of the residents were very nice to work with and their writing was legible. For the docs who scribble, you will find that they scribble the same orders all the time so you get to recognize the scribble, believe it or not. And, if you don't recognize it, you call them on the phone and question them about it or learn to grab their charts and look at their orders quickly before they walk off your unit. I also found that if you are respectful and act a bit of a personal assistant to them when they are on the floor (because they are really out of their element) they will usually be grateful for the assist. You'd be surprised at the docs who do remember the names of the hospital nurses who are kind and helpful to them. For those docs that continuously act like jerks--disappear when they show up and let them fend for themselves.

starsINmyEYES · Dec 2, 2007

I although I think that all healthcare professionals should have a legal obligation to write in a legible manner.

TOTALLY!!!!!!!!!!

rph3664 · Dec 2, 2007

When I told my parents that I wanted to be a pharmacist, my mom said, "A lot of those doctors have awfully big egos" and told me what she witnessed as a hospital volunteer in the early 1970s.

An OB with quite a reputation backhanded a nurse when she didn't get him something quickly enough. :eek: Smacked her across the face and sent her spinning around the nurse's station! If anyone did that now, they would be arrested and probably have their license revoked as well. I should add that this OB was well known for doing unnecessary episiotomies and then sewing the women up so tight, they couldn't have sex with their husbands. I knew his son when we were teenagers, and he was quite the "I'm so cool, everyone has to wear a coat when I'm around" type and a Google search revealed that he's an attorney - probably a dirty one to boot.

My experience with doctors is that they're the same as the rest of us - they have their quirks and most of them are nice people. The ones who are jerks would be jerks no matter what they did for a living. I have actually had more problems with women doctors than male ones, and (rph3664 puts on a flameproof suit) nurses' handwriting isn't any better than doctors'! We have to call you all the time to decipher orders, so watch out!