The corner of his eye

Two small things that bother me in the course of my day.

1)All the TVs in all the hospital and medical office waiting rooms are on Jerry Springer or soap operas, and not on CNN.

2)You can't get Diet Caffine Free soda at the kid's hospital.

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I don't mean to complain.

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One big thing that bothers me.

Most of my patients are not sick. Or are not as sick as they pretend.

Case of the day: Get called to doctor's office for teenager unresponsive. The kid is six two, two hundred twenty pounds of high school linebacker. He had surgery a couple weeks agao, and today started having belly pain. At the doctor's office he had blood drawn then threw up, then lay down on the exam table, closed his eyes and was all limp. The medical staff is freaking out. The kid has stable vital signs, good capillary refill, his eyelids twitch when you move your finger toward his eyes, hold his hand up over his head and let go, and he moves the hand to avoid hitting his face. He also smells like diarrhea. When you get him in the ambulance, and take out an IV, he is watching you out of the corner of his eye. He flinches when you stick him.

I have gone through this and similar scenarios hundreds of times. Okay, you're not feeling well, but you are not sick enough that you have to pretend to be unconcious.

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Other calls: an old lady with chest pain for two days since her daughter had a stroke, a pscyh who had walked out of the ER the night before, a transfer from the hospital to a nursing home, and a prisioner hyperventilating and claiming chest pain just prior to his transfer to a tougher facility.