My friend, Ru, once wrote about driving down the road and spotting some roadkill lying there with a fresh coat of white, striping paint running right over its flattened carcass. Her observation was how no one bothered to take responsibility to move the dead beast because "It's not my job."
That was kind of how my day was today. So far November is kicking my butt. I think I had a 15-minute break total during my 10-hour day. The story is too boring and difficult to condense, but it basically ends with me having to do a rectal exam on a patient that should have been done 5 days ago. In the process, I got chewed out by a discharge planner who said I had to "get it done in the next 10 minutes or the patient won't have a bed to go to tomorrow" when said discharge planner did not return my pages for > 2 hours earlier in the day.
From my point of view, today's chain of events are the end result of a big steaming pile of incompetence involving the admitting attending, senior resident and intern; the intern that dumped this patient on me; my senior resident; my attending; and the discharge planner. I have no idea if this lady will get out of the hospital tomorrow or not, but I think the above persons should have to split to $500 cost of another day in a hospital bed between them. I was fuming by the end of this task, as I couldn't simply develop the test card on my own as there is another steaming pile of beaurocracy that prevents one from being able to get anything done without formally having a nurse enter orders in a computer.
If I was a smarter woman, I would have just told the planner that the task was impossible to get done that quickly and not spent another second worrying about it. But I am not a smart woman, and I don't even heed my own advice about not letting people get on your nerves.
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And then I stepped out into the night... It was only 5:15 pm, but the sky was completely black. Snowflakes twirled in the yellow light of a streetlight. The flakes stuck like velcro to my black wool peacoat, and for an instant it was oddly tranquil, the calmness flickering down on me like the little chips of plastic in a snowglobe.
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I went for a run at the gym after all of that. And now, instead of being exhausted and angry, I am simply exhausted.
That was kind of how my day was today. So far November is kicking my butt. I think I had a 15-minute break total during my 10-hour day. The story is too boring and difficult to condense, but it basically ends with me having to do a rectal exam on a patient that should have been done 5 days ago. In the process, I got chewed out by a discharge planner who said I had to "get it done in the next 10 minutes or the patient won't have a bed to go to tomorrow" when said discharge planner did not return my pages for > 2 hours earlier in the day.
From my point of view, today's chain of events are the end result of a big steaming pile of incompetence involving the admitting attending, senior resident and intern; the intern that dumped this patient on me; my senior resident; my attending; and the discharge planner. I have no idea if this lady will get out of the hospital tomorrow or not, but I think the above persons should have to split to $500 cost of another day in a hospital bed between them. I was fuming by the end of this task, as I couldn't simply develop the test card on my own as there is another steaming pile of beaurocracy that prevents one from being able to get anything done without formally having a nurse enter orders in a computer.
If I was a smarter woman, I would have just told the planner that the task was impossible to get done that quickly and not spent another second worrying about it. But I am not a smart woman, and I don't even heed my own advice about not letting people get on your nerves.
----------
And then I stepped out into the night... It was only 5:15 pm, but the sky was completely black. Snowflakes twirled in the yellow light of a streetlight. The flakes stuck like velcro to my black wool peacoat, and for an instant it was oddly tranquil, the calmness flickering down on me like the little chips of plastic in a snowglobe.
----------
I went for a run at the gym after all of that. And now, instead of being exhausted and angry, I am simply exhausted.
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1 comment:
I am right there with you about not following your own advice. There are so many times when I look back and say that I shouldv'e known better. Well that isn't true, I DID know better, I just chose to do otherwise. Maddening isn't it?
Chris
My Blog
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