How are those doctors treating you?

Ruby Vee, BSN · Nov 25, 2007

i have a pretty good working relationship with most of our docs, but there is one intensivist who is a real a$$. word is that he doesn't like people who are overweight, and i'll confess that i'm definitely overweight. yesterday, he came in and said that "the patient's abdomen is "full, to use the politically correct term." (patient is as wide as she is tall.) then he looked me up and down and said "we're not allowed to say someone is "fat" anymore," and proceded to announce that he couldn't understand how anyone would let themselves become obese. the patient was comatose, and he was directing all of his remarks at me, anyway.

i said, "yes, and people are becoming more and more rude these days. in fact, some are downright nasty."

this same doctor was walking out of the hospital a few months ago as my husband and i were walking in. i said "good evening, dr. xxxx. how are you?" dh didn't say anything. dr. xxxxx turned to dh. turning his back on me and saying "good, evening, matt. how are you?" totally ignored me. that sort of stuff is just plain rude.

but i can't say that anyone other than this guy has been nasty in the past year. that could be because i'm old enough and assertive enough not to tolerate it, and this guy is just oblivious.

Xbox Live Addict · Nov 25, 2007

Please rate your doctor-nurse relationships over the past year.
"Bad behavior" consists of all negative behaviors, from disrespectful talk all the way up to violence.
Please feel free to discuss your experiences regarding your work relationships.

At the LTC facility which I left this year after nearly 3 years, the medical director was notoriously abrasive during phone calls, frequently made snide remarks to the Administration about the competence of the nursing staff (at one point, I told the DON that if my father or mother ever had to come to this facility for nursing care, they had by God better not assign this doctor to him, or even allow him in the same room.), and was generally unhelpful during facility rounds. Very unprofessional behavior all around, and I'm glad he is not a part of my working life anymore. If he was in the mood, he would make personal verbal attacks against nurses. I was never the recipient of any such attacks, he mainly angered me by his obstinance and rude slurs on the facility staff. Now, I only deal with one physician (our Center Medical Director), and believe me, he is a MAJOR improvement over this other doc.

GooeyRN, ADN, BSN, CNA, LPN, RN · Nov 25, 2007

Normally, our doctors are great. Its just one that is very rude, curses, and hangs up on us. Everyone know's he does it, and no one cares. I did have a problem recently with another dr, he didn't want to come in when the pt mother was DEMANDING to see their doctor. (post op appy, child was having new onset pain) Yes, it was during the night. No, I didn't believe there was anything seriously wrong with the patient. It seemed like anxiety to me. But I can't just say shut up and go to sleep. The doctor will see you in the am. What if something were really wrong? It would be my butt.

shmoofins · Feb 8, 2008

A lot of our doctors are rude and just expect to get their way all the time. Of course the management just encourages that because they're too scared of losing them to a competing hospital. We have one doc that's really awful to the staff but nothing's ever done about it.

jessiern, BSN, RN · Feb 13, 2008

Most of our docs are pretty considerate of the nurses. They like to be petted and pampered, but in return they usually treat us with respect and hear us out when we have a problem. Our admin. keeps them in line.

We do have one that can get a little snippy and say some harsh stuff, but she always apolagizes later. And I can deal with that. It is a stressful environment, and we can all get like that from time to time.

Really the only standing problem that we have is a new doc. She is just out of school, and IMO only concerned about money. Her office is open 7am to 9pm Monday to Friday, and 9am to 7pm on Saturday. She rounds on her patients at the hospital around midnight, and has discharged people at that time(Including a 96 year old woman who was cared for by her 75 year old daughter. They got to stay till the am hours). Sometimes she will go days without seeing patients that she admits. She doesn't return our phone calls. Her behavior in my opinion puts patients at risk, makes the hospital look bad, and us look bad. Patients think we don't care when we dont' get them pain meds and they hurt. But our hands are tied if she will not call us back. And, I want to know what kind of drugs she is on to have those kind of hours, and when she sees her 14 yr old son?

UM Review RN, ASN, RN · Feb 13, 2008

Most of our docs are pretty considerate of the nurses. They like to be petted and pampered, but in return they usually treat us with respect and hear us out when we have a problem. Our admin. keeps them in line.
We do have one that can get a little snippy and say some harsh stuff, but she always apolagizes later. And I can deal with that. It is a stressful environment, and we can all get like that from time to time.
Really the only standing problem that we have is a new doc. She is just out of school, and IMO only concerned about money. Her office is open 7am to 9pm Monday to Friday, and 9am to 7pm on Saturday. She rounds on her patients at the hospital around midnight, and has discharged people at that time(Including a 96 year old woman who was cared for by her 75 year old daughter. They got to stay till the am hours). Sometimes she will go days without seeing patients that she admits. She doesn't return our phone calls. Her behavior in my opinion puts patients at risk, makes the hospital look bad, and us look bad. Patients think we don't care when we dont' get them pain meds and they hurt. But our hands are tied if she will not call us back. And, I want to know what kind of drugs she is on to have those kind of hours, and when she sees her 14 yr old son?

The things you describe are unsafe. This doc needs to be reported to Risk Management every time a phone call goes out that is not answered within an hour. She's putting the whole hospital at risk.

nursesail · Nov 18, 2008

The :nono:doctor that treated me badly was written up. I did not let him get away with it.

MaryAnn_RN · Nov 19, 2008

I work with one doctor who refused yesterday to clear up his sharps, threw equipment on the floor, refused to write prescriptions - generally acted like a prima donna.

Everything on a verbal instruction; I really wanted to give him a couple of verbal instructions too.

lpnflorida · Nov 29, 2008

This year I have been either very lucky, or just in the right place at the right time. There was another year however in which a Doctor was horrible. He is known for this, it seems one of his triggers is when he asks something about the patient . The nurse " me in this instance" says I just started working with this patient today and in report ........ well that is enough to set off his tirad. He does not it seems want to hear how well or not well we know his patients,, yikes....

nogard · Dec 16, 2008

We have a few docs who I wouldn't mind getting into a boxing ring with after work and taking some physical aggression out on :argue:

I feel the nursing staff is at fault in a way, because everytime one of these passive-aggressive MDs arrives to our floor, regardless of everybody's opinion of the individual, some brown-noser has to greet the MD as if they were a life-long friend who they haven't seen in years. To put it plain and simple, they kiss mucho butt. :trout:

As a new RN with quite a bit of experience under my belt, I've found it better to maintain a strictly professional relationship with the MDs who come off like they're God. I will address them appropriately whenever I meet them in the hall, but no butt-kissing. It's real simple: write my orders and let me know if there's anything special you need me to do for the patient. As little as you want to speak to me, I want to speak to you even less.

Pediatric Critical Care Columnist · Dec 16, 2008

Last year one of our cardiovascular surgical fellows wrote an entry on his blog that created quite a stir. This is a quote:

The lack of professionalism (dress, informality/familiarity, impoliteness, disrespect); nurses calling in "sick"; intensivist that think they are the only ones capable of managing post-op cardiac surgical patients; OR delays and summer slow-downs; provincialism; doctors "treating trials" rather than using clinical judgement; entitlement; surgeons abdicating the care of their patients.

He has since followed up verbally with his complaints about our unit, our methods, and most especially our nursing "deficiencies" and the nasty comments seem to come thicker and faster when we've had to cancel his ORs. He sees it as an attitude problem that we're often short-staffed and stretched too thin when we've had an exodus of nurses due to poor management, heavy workloads and heaps of moral distress. He doesn't ever look around him and see that a big part of our bottleneck problem is that our unit is clogged with their (CV surgery) poor outcomes. We have two kids in the unit right now who have both had heart transplants... yippee, right? Well, both of them are CRRT-dependent and the younger one is inotrope dependent as well. Weren't they supposed to be fixed? One of them has been in the unit pretty much since April and the other one since last December! Then there're the two hypoplasts who aren't going anywhere soon, the DORV/ASD/VSD/Coarct kiddie who will be with us for months to come and a cardiomyopathy that is waiting on a heart. Right there we have 1/3 of our beds taken up with kids who aren't going to be leaving us any time soon. If the unit were only a CVICU that'd be one thing but we're an all-things-to-all-people unit. What do we do with the kids whose hearts aren't their problems?