medical staff rant!

I must say 1st off that this doesnt apply to all, as up until last nite every1 who have treate

d me have been amazin!

BUT ...

Does any other asthmatic get mightly pissd off wen the get 1. Branded with the every1 who has asthma have the same symptoms! 2. U need to get more air into ur lungs... No shit, thats y im here! And 3. U need to slow ur breathing down...i sometime wonder whether they themselves have ever had it where their air ways r so swallon, u cnt breath properly and t over compensate! Gr mayb i shuld tel them to go away and breath thro a straw continuosly 4 6 hours flat and them nt become tired, and take shorter breaths!

Sorry had to b done, afta bein rushd bk in and tellin thdm doctor the best form of treatment 4 me!

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yes

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hardest thing i find is when you got staff on that don't know you and don't listen my last admission asked for another bag of amno[hylin to be written up b4 current 1 ran out as new chest hadn't settled but staff on chang of shift got it crossed off say ing that i had had 2 badgs and was demanding a 3rd. needless to say didn't get bag so went off again that night and ended up with doc on call and guess what drip went back up and when finished chest was happy and i knew it had settled. if only they would listen.

[Annista]

I think that at some point we've all wanted to tell the medical staff to remove their head from whatever orifice they're keeping it in and just LISTEN.

I hope your rant helped you to feel better.

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Annista.......LOVE that description

[Annista]

I'm full of 'em, FeeJay. Well, full of something, anyway

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Love it Annista!

Sorry that you had a bad experience, Charlie. I find that it really depends on the particular doctor that you see. Some of them are really excellent and some of them are a bit dismissive of asthma, which I always find disappointing. I can't usually talk much when I'm admitted, otherwise I'd love to tell them my long and complex medical history, and advise them about the best treatment to give me. As it is, I tend to be so caught up in the effort of each breath, I just let them get on with it, and hope that they know what they're doing!

I do have a medical folder, which has a written plan for acute exacerbations, which some doctors are happy to follow (if I've been admitted from home and actually have it with me!). I find that the more senior doctors are quite happy to take advice, but the brand-new, fresh out of medical school ones hate having to treat a knowledgeable (and medically trained) patient, and absolutely refuse to deviate from their own treatment plan unless a senior doctor intervenes. Friends of mine (most of whom are now registrars) all take asthma extremely seriously and have been known to give a good b*llocking to junior doctors who don't!

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I dnt think i have ever argued with a doc untill the next day wen i can start to talk reasonably again...i do have a medical plan and also some doctors are really happy to follow what i always have, and others like to make it up as they go along...ive also had it where two consultants have been at the end of the trolley in resus arguing about what to do and in the end they left it to later and i ended up in intensive care...really not on that occasion!!!

Id be happy though if they kinda didnt tarnish all with same brush...which the baby docs do coz they havny had enough expeirnece!!!

Guess they gotta learn, just not to the hands of my death really

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I guess you have to hope they learn - there are some junior docs I suspect who will, however much experience they have, turn into the kind of consultant who gives you 5 mins of their time in clinic, never listens and has never heard of a bedside manner.

I don't have as much experience as some on here but so far the worst I've seen (other than the unhelpful breed of GP who is more common than I'd like) have been senior consultants (not all of them) - one very senior one who was not as bad as some but I felt was rather going through the motions. All the best ones have been at the registrar level - specialist registrar at bronchoscopy (all the team there were really good actually) who had an uncanny ability to read body language and seemed to be able to tell what I was worrying about without asking, one I saw who was on duty at OOH and didn't just think I was there for fun, and one cardiac one I saw after treadmill test with 'dizzy' episode. Any rants I personally have automatically exclude them!

Does worry me sometimes the way some of them seem to be able to get through a medical career without developing what I would have thought were essential skills like listening and communicating.

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Y y y does the nurse persist in questioninin me! I gota av nebs thro o2 coz my resp nurse told me that she wants my sats above 95...i didnt decide it! I gota av double strength of all my oral asthma meds because my chest physician has prescribed it like that, nt me! I cnt help have keerknackerd broncy bits but i also sure as hel didnt alter my drug chart to or write in my medical notes my over nite plan! GRRR ARSE HOLES!

argh, rant over, as if bein im hospital wasnt bad enough! X

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Don't b too hard on the nurse..... If they administer a drug they have got to b aware the correct dose route and side effects now. If they administer a drug dose known to be over the correct dOse it's them that have the disciplinary action and not the dr that wrote the prescription and no one wAnts too loose they job. So they will always question something that doesn't follow the normal trends .....

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Once upon a time had lovely old GP. When he was on holiday, the son came in as locum. Caring manner totally non-existent and when called out on home visit was exceedingly grumpy.

Years later, taking young baby into sick kids hospital, here was that self same son gone on to qualify in paediatrics. Hadn't improved him one iota. No quiet room for appt, he saw his patients in the corridor. Telling me that babies couldn't possibly be allergic to cow's milk, he gave her a bottle which of course she wolfed down as very hungry. Handed baby back and went to walk off when I stopped him, gently put the baby back in his arms and gleefully watched as she was very definitely sick all over him. Also explained that I'd done the research and discovered milk allergy first recognised way back in 1928. Silenced. Game, set and match.

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Grannymo......YES! Lol.

Gussypoo - very true. It's scary now in nursing....you have to be so careful with everything you administer.

Charlie - yes it is terribly frustrating but if it's getting too bad you could suggest that the nurse contacts the prescribing doctor? On my last admission they were insisting that I couldn't have nebs driven by O2....until they saw me with the neb mask on....and the O2 mask over the top as I felt completely suffocated without the O2 and sats dropped whenever I took it off.....they then gave me O2 driven nebs and the lovely nurses spoke to the doctor concerned and made sure the nebs were writeen up to be driven with O2.

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its not right that we are all treated the same - usually as if we are a snack short of a picnic....at my recent stay i had the displeasure to witness a very awful bedside manner. my resp consultant- who apparently is lovely but it didnt show this time- went to sit with an elderly patient who was obviously very ill, he didnt pull the curtains round the bed, didnt ask for relatives to be present, didnt lower his voice and was quite short and abrupt. he told her that if she went into resp arrest he wasnt going to bring her back and was that alright with her- to which she replied 'what ok with you leaving me to die?' 'well im not going to hurry it along but its for the best'. this poor woman was then just left, no nurse to hold her hand, no comfort from the doctor, it was awful. i know there are some lovely medical staff out there but its things like this and whats making the headlines at the min with the killer nurse that make people scared to be ill and vulnerable.

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Jay, that's terrible! He shouldn't be allowed to get away with that - especially as he's senior. It wouldn't be good in a junior doctor either but more understandable if they hadn't had the experience and weren't sure how to handle the situation, but a consultant really ought to know better. Some of them do seem to think bedside manner is optional or possibly an annoyance which those pesky patients insist on.

Come to think of it, worst 2 I've ever had have been neurology consultants (for a non-asthma problem which luckily has now been more or less sorted by physio). no. 1 was the one who walked in during my EMG (fetched by registrar), didn't look at me, speak directly to me or introduce herself, then plunged a needle into my painful arm.

no. 2 was the neuro cons. I was seeing in clinic, who said:

'Your results are normal. Nothing else I can do.'

'Me: You can't recommend I see someone else then? My arm and shoulder really hurt pretty much all the time.

Cons. (shrugs and discharges me) No, no point, no-one else would be able to do anything. You could do with losing some weight though, that might help. [cons does not actually have any idea how much I weigh, the only figures he can possibly have had put my BMI under 25, and I can't possibly have been more than maybe a pound or 2 over a healthy weight for me at that time - my lovely flatmate thought it was funny (which it sort of was once I stopped being so angry) and told me to stop pigging out and walking on my hands which she'd never have done if I actually had a weight problem which she was being too nice to mention.]

Given they're neuro consultants and must have to give out horrendous news sometimes, wonder how they'd deal with it if that was how they dealt with me and a relatively non-serious problem!

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Granted it is her job to check...but the concerning bit was that she questioned me of the change before looking at the drug chart...so for example my montilukast had change to a higher dose than from when she gave it to me the previouse night and because she assumed she just auomatically gave me the previous nights dose, i then had to tell her of increase and dhe questioned me...thts when i got annoyed as she clearly hadnt looked at prescription...and then if she had dhevwould havecalso noticed the clear instructions to give nebs via o2...its not that i was being fussy or arrogant, it was clear concern for my own well being whilst being under her care that she wasnt even looking at the prescription!!