I'm very curious. I'm sure we've all been there. We've dealt with doctors from all spectrum and mindsets. Most are very good at their jobs and have sound ideas!
But sometimes docs just say and do the craziest things
My example: at my last LTC facility I had one doctor seriously outright refuse/fight giving and prescribing pain meds (for patients who really, really needed it/were on vents/dying) because he honestly believed that these residents who had been stuck in a bed for years were going to get better and go out to buy/smoke crack cocaine.
According to him "prescribing narcotics leads to methadone and crack usage." These poor residents have been here for years taking the same medications and pain meds for years...just WHAT?
When a senior doctor refused my request for a urinary catheter in a patient with Breast CA + mets to the brain (=every position change was painful) who was receiving mannitol and chemo (=lots of cytotoxic urine to come in contact with) and the new resident from India said to me "you'll get plenty of practice changing diapers!".
ARE YOU F*&^$# KIDDING ME?!
Never in my life have I wanted to punch someone more than in that moment...
When a senior doctor refused my request for a urinary catheter in a patient with Breast CA + mets to the brain (=every position change was painful) who was receiving mannitol and chemo (=lots of cytotoxic urine to come in contact with) and the new resident from India said to me "you'll get plenty of practice changing diapers!".
ARE YOU F*&^$# KIDDING ME?!
Never in my life have I wanted to punch someone more than in that moment...
Well, I congratulate you on your restraint. I think I would have verbally punched him in the face, by referring to patient dignity, risks to caregivers re: cytotoxicity. I might also have mentioned potential lawsuits from staff re: adverse effects to staff from unnecessary exposure to toxic chemicals. Once you throw out the L word (and I do mean L as in LAWSUIT) they tend to be more agreeable. I would also ask how the media might react to these lawsuits and the implications for him. These jokers don't always lose their medical licenss but they do get fined and have to pay big bucks and the adverse publicity can totally destroy their reputations. I might also remind him of the vow to "do no harm" and how he is causing harm to the patient by inflicting pain with the bed changes. Maybe his licensing body would be interested to know about how he violated his vow to do no harm.
Well I've been a patient a lot due to chronic illness. I have had a dr say to me that "I was a drain on resources and stop acting like a baby"
I've had a doctor scream in my face "what do you take, we know your on drugs" I had serotonin sickness and was near death, woke up three days later with a sitter. No drugs... Learn your psychopharmacology and symptoms.
Well I've been a patient a lot due to chronic illness. I have had a dr say to me that "I was a drain on resources and stop acting like a baby"
I've had a doctor scream in my face "what do you take, we know your on drugs" I had serotonin sickness and was near death, woke up three days later with a sitter. No drugs... Learn your psychopharmacology and symptoms.
It really amazes me how people revere them so much and yet they can be so dumb and such jerks. My friend got a script for eye drops to put in her ears to loosen wax. The pharmacy didn't have the drug available so my friend asked the doc about it again and the doc said she could not recall giving her that script and told her to put peroxide in her ears to loosen the wax. The same doc also gave her the nasal live flu vaccine that is approved for people under 60 with no immunocompromise. My friend is over 80 and on chemotherapy. When I discussed it with my friend, she acted like I was the incompetent one because she adores doctors so much. She just thinks they are infallible and can do no wrong. That doc will end up killing the poor lady yet.
My former PCP insisted I needed my ears irrigated in her office. I told her no because of having so much scar tissue on the ear drum that my ENT said to come back to him if I had issues. Well, I wasn't there for ear pain, just my annual exam required by my employer.
I got an earful about how necessary it is to do yearly, that I may go deaf, & that he routinely does it....
I got a bill for it & for a flu shot I also refused to take. I had just gotten a FREE one at work. It was the one time I answered the insurance nurse call after my visit. She got an earful & he got investigated for medical insurance fraud by the feds. He found out you can't bill for 500 flu shots but only order 100 single dose syringes!
My former PCP insisted I needed my ears irrigated in her office. I told her no because of having so much scar tissue on the ear drum that my ENT said to come back to him if I had issues. Well, I wasn't there for ear pain, just my annual exam required by my employer.
I got an earful about how necessary it is to do yearly, that I may go deaf, & that he routinely does it....
I got a bill for it & for a flu shot I also refused to take. I had just gotten a FREE one at work. It was the one time I answered the insurance nurse call after my visit. She got an earful & he got investigated for medical insurance fraud by the feds. He found out you can't bill for 500 flu shots but only order 100 single dose syringes!
I just watched a documentary Code Black. There were doctors who spoke about how they wanted to help people, etc. and that was their motivation for entering the profession. My friend had 3 doctor sons. And what was their motivation. Pure and simple -- money. One got investigated for selling drugs on the Internet. His friend got investigated for charging the system money for work done by his nurse not by him. He had the nurse see patients instead of him but he got the money. It is just a cash grab for some, unfortunately.
Specializes in LTC, CPR instructor, First aid instructor..
I renamed my former PCP whom I had for 10 very long years Dr. Fester because he became a fester in my side. I got so much worse. After I left him, I got a new PCP who I named Dr. Professional because he saved my life twice.
I worked with a nurse who told the family their deceased relative was still alive because they were on the ward not the ICU, and in the country she came from, people were sent to ICU to die, nobody died on the ward. Her reasoning was, despite absence of respirations and pulse the patient must still be alive. You can imagine how stressed the family members were. They kept telling her the patient was dead and she kept saying "no, no, he arrive." She pronounced "alive" as "arrive." The poor family wondered where the patient had arrived at. It was very bad. I would think that the inability to tell whether a patient is dead or alive would be just cause for termination of employment, but it was not. Very scary.
Specializes in Med nurse in med-surg., float, HH, and PDN.
When I was a kid of about 9 or 10, I was abused by the dentist in our town.
I had a hair-trigger and tremendously strong gag-reflex, over which I had NO control. He seemed to enjoy letting pieces of the amalgam he was using to fill a cavity, drop down into the back of my throat. He'd tell me to "STOP IT!" when I inevitably started gagging. Following the gagging that continued without relief,( ie the amalgam wasn't vac'd out or rinsed out), the next occurrence was me pushing him out of the way with both hands as I was shooting into a sitting position (and cutting my forehead on the big overhead lamp). And then I threw up. Everywhere. For which he belittled and cussed me. There was no dental ass't nor receptionist at his office. After he got things cleaned just enough so that he could finish the job he'd started on my mouth. He muttered saying what a baby I was, etc. as he worked, then he gave a sharp sigh of exasperation because I'd gagged again.I started crying, which made him even madder; he said "If you don't shut-up and quit crying, I'm going to send you home with a big hole in your tooth!"
(No, I didn't tell anybody)
I'd say that he was the reason for my dental phobia; I was so PTSD'd that if there was a CREST commercial on TV, I would leave the room! And if real-life people started talking about teeth or dentists or appointments anywhere in my general vicinity, even if I wasn't even any part of their conversation....I would grow warm , feel that 'fight or flight' impulse, with my heart beating faster and faster. I felt 'trapped', so I would try to stay as still as possible so as not to be noticed on the off-chance that someone would remark that *I* needed to go to the dentist.
Thereafter, I would avoid the dentist for six to twelve years at a time, only going in if I had an abcess....My teeth really were horrible even at that young age; not totally caused by diet, but rather that I completely ignored my mouth and hardly ever brushed. Once in a while I would give a flick of the toothbrush to the front teeth that showed.
Wanna hear the kicker? This mean dentist who cowed me....became a teacher and clinical instructor at Tufts/New England Medical Center's Dental School program! HA! and I don't mean a funny 'ha'.
Ooooh, you don't know how many letters I have written to him or about him, over the years...... but did not mail.
The one good thing he did for me, though he had no clue then or probably even later, was to make me stronger in the conviction that "when I grew up", I would NEVER treat people as meanly as he did. I would be an advocate ( again, a word learned later in life),and I wouldn't punish them for feeling scared. I would be nice, and help them through things. I wanted them not to feel ashamed. I wanted to make sure nobody else had to carry all that the way I'd done.
When I was a kid of about 9 or 10, I was abused by the dentist in our town.
I had a hair-trigger and tremendously strong gag-reflex, over which I had NO control. He seemed to enjoy letting pieces of the amalgam he was using to fill a cavity, drop down into the back of my throat. He'd tell me to "STOP IT!" when I inevitably started gagging. Following the gagging that continued without relief,( ie the amalgam wasn't vac'd out or rinsed out), the next occurrence was me pushing him out of the way with both hands as I was shooting into a sitting position (and cutting my forehead on the big overhead lamp). And then I threw up. Everywhere. For which he belittled and cussed me. There was no dental ass't nor receptionist at his office. After he got things cleaned just enough so that he could finish the job he'd started on my mouth. He muttered saying what a baby I was, etc. as he worked, then he gave a sharp sigh of exasperation because I'd gagged again.I started crying, which made him even madder; he said "If you don't shut-up and quit crying, I'm going to send you home with a big hole in your tooth!"
(No, I didn't tell anybody)
I'd say that he was the reason for my dental phobia; I was so PTSD'd that if there was a CREST commercial on TV, I would leave the room! And if real-life people started talking about teeth or dentists or appointments anywhere in my general vicinity, even if I wasn't even any part of their conversation....I would grow warm , feel that 'fight or flight' impulse, with my heart beating faster and faster. I felt 'trapped', so I would try to stay as still as possible so as not to be noticed on the off-chance that someone would remark that *I* needed to go to the dentist.
Thereafter, I would avoid the dentist for six to twelve years at a time, only going in if I had an abcess....My teeth really were horrible even at that young age; not totally caused by diet, but rather that I completely ignored my mouth and hardly ever brushed. Once in a while I would give a flick of the toothbrush to the front teeth that showed.
Wanna hear the kicker? This mean dentist who cowed me....became a teacher and clinical instructor at Tufts/New England Medical Center's Dental School program! HA! and I don't mean a funny 'ha'.
Ooooh, you don't know how many letters I have written to him or about him, over the years...... but did not mail.
The one good thing he did for me, though he had no clue then or probably even later, was to make me stronger in the conviction that "when I grew up", I would NEVER treat people as meanly as he did. I would be an advocate ( again, a word learned later in life),and I wouldn't punish them for feeling scared. I would be nice, and help them through things. I wanted them not to feel ashamed. I wanted to make sure nobody else had to carry all that the way I'd done.
I would write a letter to his licensing body now, like the one you put on this post. Even if they don't discipline him because it has been so many years, at least they would be aware.
When I was a kid of about 9 or 10, I was abused by the dentist in our town.
I had a hair-trigger and tremendously strong gag-reflex, over which I had NO control. He seemed to enjoy letting pieces of the amalgam he was using to fill a cavity, drop down into the back of my throat. He'd tell me to "STOP IT!" when I inevitably started gagging. Following the gagging that continued without relief,( ie the amalgam wasn't vac'd out or rinsed out), the next occurrence was me pushing him out of the way with both hands as I was shooting into a sitting position (and cutting my forehead on the big overhead lamp). And then I threw up. Everywhere. For which he belittled and cussed me. There was no dental ass't nor receptionist at his office. After he got things cleaned just enough so that he could finish the job he'd started on my mouth. He muttered saying what a baby I was, etc. as he worked, then he gave a sharp sigh of exasperation because I'd gagged again.I started crying, which made him even madder; he said "If you don't shut-up and quit crying, I'm going to send you home with a big hole in your tooth!"
(No, I didn't tell anybody)
I'd say that he was the reason for my dental phobia; I was so PTSD'd that if there was a CREST commercial on TV, I would leave the room! And if real-life people started talking about teeth or dentists or appointments anywhere in my general vicinity, even if I wasn't even any part of their conversation....I would grow warm , feel that 'fight or flight' impulse, with my heart beating faster and faster. I felt 'trapped', so I would try to stay as still as possible so as not to be noticed on the off-chance that someone would remark that *I* needed to go to the dentist.
Thereafter, I would avoid the dentist for six to twelve years at a time, only going in if I had an abcess....My teeth really were horrible even at that young age; not totally caused by diet, but rather that I completely ignored my mouth and hardly ever brushed. Once in a while I would give a flick of the toothbrush to the front teeth that showed.
Wanna hear the kicker? This mean dentist who cowed me....became a teacher and clinical instructor at Tufts/New England Medical Center's Dental School program! HA! and I don't mean a funny 'ha'.
Ooooh, you don't know how many letters I have written to him or about him, over the years...... but did not mail.
The one good thing he did for me, though he had no clue then or probably even later, was to make me stronger in the conviction that "when I grew up", I would NEVER treat people as meanly as he did. I would be an advocate ( again, a word learned later in life),and I wouldn't punish them for feeling scared. I would be nice, and help them through things. I wanted them not to feel ashamed. I wanted to make sure nobody else had to carry all that the way I'd done.
I'm so sorry this happened to you I had a dentist damage my nerve doing a routine cavity filling. I now have extreme anxiety over anything dental related (commercials, conversation, cleanings, ect). I have to get my wisdom teeth out soon, and I should have gotten them out 5 years ago. It definitely gives me some insight into how patients may feel at times.
Oh.... And the worst part about the nerve damage? The dentist denied it. He told me it was psychological, and that I needed mental help. Okay then.
I had a dentist damage my nerve doing a routine cavity filling. I now have extreme anxiety over anything dental related (commercials, conversation, cleanings, ect). I have to get my wisdom teeth out soon, and I should have gotten them out 5 years ago. It definitely gives me some insight into how patients may feel at times.
Certifiable, BSN, RN
183 Posts
When a senior doctor refused my request for a urinary catheter in a patient with Breast CA + mets to the brain (=every position change was painful) who was receiving mannitol and chemo (=lots of cytotoxic urine to come in contact with) and the new resident from India said to me "you'll get plenty of practice changing diapers!".
ARE YOU F*&^$# KIDDING ME?!
Never in my life have I wanted to punch someone more than in that moment...