Feeling humiliated/Vent.. How would you respond?

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Ok so I was in charge today:

Pt had new dx paralytic ileus. Attending doc says NG low intermittent suction. Then he decides hmmm pt has a peg I wonder if you can suction from there instead of inserting NG. He asks me to find out - call GI unit - find out if allowed or possible.

So I call GI and General systems ICU, they say - neat idea never heard of it, never done it.

So I'm told to page the surgeon who inserted the peg.

WELL BIG MISTAKE

Surgeon calls back, he's calling from the hospital. I tell him very POLITELY about the pt para ileus, the peg he put in and i ask NICELY "the attending is wondering if we can use the peg for low inter. suction?"

wellllllll

he says in a very RUDE and CONDESCENDING MANNER

"first of all, I am not on call, I was just being nice answering this page"

"i would only answer this question if the attending doc is on the other line, you are JUST A NURSE"

I WAS BEAT RED I can't even remember the rest of it. All I could remember was YOU ARE JUST A NURSE. What the heck! I was calling for clinical expertise information as I could not find it elsewhere! I did not know what to say, the only words that came out of my mouth were "I'm sorry".

I feel so humiliated! I wanted to stand up for myself but I was in such awe.

What do you do/say in these situations where a doctor berrates you? Or are you just supposed to swallow it all and apologize? What would you do?

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Specializes in Corrections, Cardiac, Hospice.

OH, WOW! How ignorant. I would have responded, "Dr. irregardless of my title I was asking you for your professional opinion as a favor to the attending. I will be more than happy to tell him you are unable to give it and will document this conversation in the patients medical record." Then I would have hung up on him. If you have a chain of command I would follow through with this, you should never be spoken to like this at work. Also, you have NO reason to feel humiliated, you did nothing wrong.:flowersfo

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Specializes in ICUs, Tele, etc..

Next time if any attending asks you to write an order for a GI consult for a new patient, and sometimes they have no preference and don't specify who, well...then you'll know which group you can exclude from that list of choices ;)

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You can't know everything all the time. Lesson learned. Drop this garbage off at the curb for someone to pick up and dispose of! You live...you learn. Oh well. And darn it anyway. I wish we knew it all...but we don't. No harm, no foul. Do the best ya can and they are lucky to have you on the case...darn it! Don't beat yourself up!

Ok so I was in charge today:

Pt had new dx paralytic ileus. Attending doc says NG low intermittent suction. Then he decides hmmm pt has a peg I wonder if you can suction from there instead of inserting NG. He asks he to find out - call GI unit - find out if allowed or possible.

So I call GI and General systems ICU, they say - neat idea never heard of it, never done it.

So I'm told to page the surgeon who inserted the peg.

WELL BIG MISTAKE

Surgeon calls back, he's calling from the hospital. I tell him very POLITELY about the pt para ileus, the peg he put in and i ask NICELY "the attending is wondering if we can use the peg for low inter. suction?"

wellllllll

he says in a very RUDE and CONDESCENDING MANNER

"first of all, I am not on call, I was just being nice answering this page"

"i would only answer this question if the attending doc is on the other line, you are JUST A NURSE"

I WAS BEAT RED I can't even remember the rest of it. All I could remember was YOU ARE JUST A NURSE. What the heck! I was calling for clinical expertise information as I could not find it elsewhere! I did not know what to say, the only words that came out of my mouth were "I'm sorry".

I feel so humiliated! I wanted to stand up for myself but I was in such awe.

What do you do/say in these situations where a doctor berrates you? Or are you just supposed to swallow it all and apologize? What would you do?

Up Vote Up Vote ×

Holy Cow!

Well you are way nicer than I am, that kind of attitude irregardless of position lasts about five seconds with me. I would have said point blank "Well, I'm sorry I wasted MY time" and I would have been as equally condescending. I know that is not exactly professional, but by the sounds of it it wouldn't matter what you said or how you said it. I've only been an RN for a couple of years but I occasionally work charge in ICU and ER, and let me tell you as nurses we have far better things to do than to put up with some ill mannered physician on an ego trip. I rarely have to deal with that kind of garbage because I confront it immediately. A physician will only act like a two year old around me once and figure out quite quickly that never doing that again would be his/her best course of action. So what I'm really saying is you don't have to be a loud mouth like me, but you also do not have to be a door mat, be assertive. Besides, you're a professional and deserve to be treated as one. And as they say, what goes around comes around right!

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Specializes in ICU, ED, Transport, Home Care, Mgmnt.

:angryfire No need to apologize to that jerk.m You did nothing wrong. You explained why you called and he was the one with the problem. If you are not comfortabel with confronation then simply say I'll notify Dr. ... so he can call you himself. Then hang up, don't wait for a reply or give him another chance to prove himself to be an even bigger jerk.

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I probably wouldn't have said anything at the time, but I would have made it pretty darned hard for him in the future whenever he wanted something extra: "I'm sorry, Dr., I'm just a nurse."

What an a-hole!!! Obviously he doesn't recall the first lesson he should have learned as an intern: do NOT pi$$ off the nurses because they will make your life miserable! I wonder where he thinks he would be without nurses?

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Specializes in Med onc, med, surg, now in ICU!.

I would have said "Yes, I am "just a nurse", and that's why the attending asked me to make this call for him. Because I'm "just a nurse", I have the time to make calls for other people who are too busy to check up on their own orders". I also probably would have got into trouble for being insolent, but too bad!

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OH, WOW! How ignorant. I would have responded, "Dr. irregardless of my title I was asking you for your professional opinion as a favor to the attending. I will be more than happy to tell him you are unable to give it and will document this conversation in the patients medical record." Then I would have hung up on him. If you have a chain of command I would follow through with this, you should never be spoken to like this at work. Also, you have NO reason to feel humiliated, you did nothing wrong.:flowersfo

Sweet!

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Specializes in Nephrology, Cardiology, ER, ICU.

Wow - how ignorant of this MD. I wouldn't probably have been too nice either...I think you did fine in the circumstances.

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Hopefully you would have said "Dr regardless of my title I was asking you for your professional opinion as a favor to the attending. I will be more than happy to tell him you are unable to give it and will document this conversation in the patients medical record." "Irregardless" is not a proper word and it may give him more ammunition against you. Aside from the grammar, where do these physicians get off talking to anyone that way. This doctor has mental health issues (which are not your problem) and needs someone to look down on. He picks on nurses because he thinks they can't or won't fight back. I bet he would never speak to a fellow physician or the CEO like that. It just shows what a weak, stupid twit he is. One possible response is, "Excuse me? I am nurse, not "just a nurse" and I was carrying out a request from the attending physician. I will pass your message along to him. I also want to let you know, your comment was totally inappropriate and I don't tolerate people speaking to me like that. You will hear more about this." (Of course, you never think of these things at the time.) Then, submit a QCC to your manager and if you think he/she won't follow up, send a copy to HR, the CEO, and the medical director. Most hospitals don't tolerate that type of thing anymore, at least not in this area.

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Specializes in Med-Surg.

Whatever I said the words "I'm sorry" would not have come out. You have nothing to apologize for. My answer would have been to focus on the patient and information I needed. "Are you going to answer my question or not?".

I'm sorry this MD made you feel that way. I would have probably been beet red and tongue tied myself.

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