Get it off your chest! What's the rudest thing a doctor ever said to you?

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What's the rudest thing a doctor said to you and how did you handle it?

I haven't had any run ins, but my preceptors have and they're not so willing to share.

So tell me yours...

Specializes in CVICU, Obs/Gyn, Derm, NICU.
I hate that so much!

Yeah ...like he is so high class (not):coollook:

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Specializes in ortho, hospice volunteer, psych,.

i worked in a locked psych ward and our patients generally had file cabinet-sized hx. one night a frequent flier went off the deep end. we ended up putting him in 4 pt. restraints and medicating him with ativan (which did absolutely nothing whatsoever.) eventually, we had to remove the restraints because of state law. he bagan acting out again and i paged the on call.

he loudly questioned my parentage (not as politely) in front of patients and staff, then told me loudly

that my education was inferior and a waste of time and money, and said that i'd probably bought my degrees. if i'd actually earned them, i wouldn't have had to call him or drag him over there.:eek:

jerk!

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Specializes in home health, dialysis, others.

In front of a patient "If I wanted infornation from you I would have asked".

"Who taught you how to do that" in a way that made it seem I was doing something wrong. Me - Doc So&So. Him 'Oh.Okay, then'.

And many others.....

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Specializes in geriatrics,wound care,hospice.

Well, while I was fully aware that the only people who get to put their hands on my body are those who are invited to, or are falling over, I didn't really take it as a sexual harrassment thing because I'm about 5'10, and @ that time, weighed 175lbs. I was twice his size.:yeah: And no surgery yet! Couple of threatening discs in neck, low back pain,yadda yadda yadda. Oh, and the "Chris" in Chris81 Is in the femenine. Not girly. Just feminine. K?:nurse:

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Specializes in Emergency Department.

Doc got right in my face a few days ago in ER very busy night....

"ARE YOU IGNORING ME ON PURPOSE I TOLD YOU TO DO SOMETHING!"

uhm. you did? I'm sorry what did you need me to do?

"i told you to help that pt use the phone."

well *#%@ me silly, i was doing high priority things instead of that. my mistake.

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Specializes in Critical Care.
WAAAAAYYYY back in the earyl '80's,before those lovely mechanized lifts, I was attempting to manually transfer a resident from his very low comfy swivel chair to his bed for our medical director to examine. Instead of assisting me, the rather smug Dr.xxxx stood behind me,ran 2 fingers down either side of my vertebral column as I was bending down to lift and said"All GOOD nurses have them...". When I inquired as to WHAT "them" are, he said"incisions, from your spinal fusion"! I was young,flustered, and SPEECHLESS.

Gah! What a f'cking creep!

:barf01:

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Specializes in ICU/CCU.

These posts really make me appreciate the docs I work with and the hospital I work in. I can't remember any of them ever being rude to me. I have had way more rude comments and negative interactions with nurses than with doctors, and even those have been few and far between.

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Specializes in OR, Nursing Professional Development.

Had a surgeon accuse me of sabotaging him one night. Why? Because he was so far behind schedule that he was demanding a second room. Because of it being late in the evening with limited staff/anesthesia resources, it wasn't possible. He was threatening to cancel his last case because he didn't want to wait for his current patient to wake up and was fully prepared to blame it all on the OR staff, not the fact that he was several hours behind.

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Specializes in Hospice.

I had a pt who had a dropping bp, increasing pulse post intestinal surgery (who was 22 btw). Called the doc over and over and over to no avail. Finally called a hospitalist I knew and that liked me to get an unauthorized consult. He ordered a ct scan. Called surgeon one more time- Dr. X, we are getting a CT per Dr. Ys recomendation because yada yada. The surgeon says 'well, there is no way that she has an infection or surgical problem. Are you sure you are checking her vitals correctly?' He sure looked like a fool when he was rushing to the hospital an hour later because the girl was leaking out of intenstines into the abdomen. Poor girl! Stupid surgeon...

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Specializes in Public Health, TB.

ESRD bp 70/50 and decreased LOC. Called a Rapid Response, no immediate return call from hospitalist, so paged the nephrologist for fluid bolus order. "Do not bolus her! You obviously don't know how to take a blood pressure!" And the confusion "well she's old and just finished dialysis. She needs a nap."

Turned out she was showering septic emboli from her dialysis catheter and she died the next day.

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Specializes in ED/ICU.

"All nurses are trained monkeys" CT surgeon

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Specializes in ER, TRAUMA, MED-SURG.

I've got one that happened in 1994, and it still seems like yesterday. I was an LPN on a med surg unit. Almost finished RN school, 2 quarters left. On a Sunday am, I had a patient who was 7 or 8 days post op open choley. He was in his early 50s and had Down's. He did have orders to ambulate with staff, and PT there didn't work that day.

After he was assessed, I told him to call when he wanted to walk. He did and I checked a sat on him, which was 99 percent, I think. He walked with me in the hall and I kept the sat montior on him. He never dropped. He wanted a coke from the machine, so I got him one. We were in the little waiting area right in front of the nsg station, and while sitting next to the machine, he started seizing. Long story short, he arrested, and we coded him forever, but he didn't makr it.

One of the CCU docs who responded to the code turned to me and asked "How do u think I'm going to feel, calling his mom and telling her u killed her son??!" Fortunatelly, he said this in front of a lot of staff, incl. the nsg sup. She wrote him up. He also said " a real nurse wouldn't have let him die."

A week later, he came to round on the floor, and I was at the desk. He said "Come make rounds with me." I looked him dead in the face and responded, "Oh, I think u need a REAL nurse." When he finished rounds, he got a seat to dictate, and the chair was a high barstool type. He leaned over and fell right out on the floor. He was obese, and landed on his back, and couldn't get up. Laid there on the floor flailing his arms and legs to try to get up. Looked like a bug, that got turned over and couldn't right himself.

Yes, I helped him up, after trying unsuccessfully not to laugh, and calling the staff to the desk for "lift help." The next day on rounds, I got an apology and flowers. When I see him now, that's still the first thing coming to mind. Karma at its finest.

Anne, RNC

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