the rain bug didn’t really bring me down. thanks to regular doses of airborne, which worked wonders for me, and for tylenol and benadryl which gave me two nights of 8 hours uninterrupted sleep.
by monday night, i was all ready to work, even if my tonsils were hurting me. i cornered the intern that night, handed her the otoscope, requested her to look at my ears, which felt like there were buzzing telephones stuck inside, and also coaxed her to check my tonsils. when she confirmed i had tonsilitis, and she obviously saw exudates, i was still thinking like i was in the philippines, and expected her to tell me to go get some anibiotic prescriptions. i realized this is america, when she patted my shoulder, told me to gargle warm water with squeezed lemons, and “you can add a little salt too, you know that good stuff”, she said.
anyway, THANK YOU ALL for your well wishes. really.
i’m on my last shift for this week tonight, and have nothing really exciting to tell you about my own patients, but can’t quite keep the story to myself about the biggest buzz in our unit that happened while i was curled up in bed, lucky enough not to witness the whole drama unfold.
one of our patients died and it is standard procedure to contact the transplant organization when a death like this occur. unfortunately, an innocent mistake was made and the name and phone number of a wrong patient was given to the organization.
you can probably imgaine what happened next.
imagine being half asleep at 1 AM, hearing the phone ring, hearing condolences , hearing explanations why donating your loved ones eyes are the best thing you should think about after you lost your loved one.
you probably know what you’ll do next if you were that daughter/son. you’ll call the hospital, demand the story and explanation why the hospital didn’t even have the decency to inform you of your mother’s death first, before contacting the transplant organization….only to find out that your mother is all well and breathing, and the call was a terrible mistake.
you also probably know what you want to do if you were that transplant representative. you’ll probably call the hospital, demand an explanation as to why you were given the wrong name, and…
well, you imagined accurately. apparently, the phone lines were burning with angry, exasperated, apologetic, overwhelmed, tired voices that didn’t stop even when the night shift finally ended. incident reports were turned in, possible termination was discussed, sighs of disbelief were expressed, sighs of relief were anticipated, but came too late.
you see, just when you thought these kind of terribly sad, unfortunate things happen only on those ridiculously unbelievably unrealistic tv shows, you will realize that life imitates soaps, and i don’t know. the only thing i know is, it is just sad.
i feel for whoever it was who gave the wrong name and number, maybe the RN, maybe the float unit secretary. i feel for the transplant representative. i feel worst for the patient’s daughter, but…somewhere along the way, i hope there will be understanding and forgiveness. after all, everybody agreed to the fact that this mistake was never done on purpose.
i don’t know when will the tongues stop wagging, or when will the blaming game end, i just hope it never happens again.
also, i’m happy the patient who was supposedly dead was actually alive. not a lot of dead people get to live again that quick.
sorry, i didn’t mean to sound so heartless.
it’s just that i still hear the ringing,
in my ears.
the rain bug didn’t really bring me down. thanks to regular doses of airborne, which worked wonders for me, and for tylenol and benadryl which gave me two nights of 8 hours uninterrupted sleep.
by monday night, i was all ready to work, even if my tonsils were hurting me. i cornered the intern that night, handed her the otoscope, requested her to look at my ears, which felt like there were buzzing telephones stuck inside, and also coaxed her to check my tonsils. when she confirmed i had tonsilitis, and she obviously saw exudates, i was still thinking like i was in the philippines, and expected her to tell me to go get some anibiotic prescriptions. i realized this is america, when she patted my shoulder, told me to gargle warm water with squeezed lemons, and “you can add a little salt too, you know that good stuff”, she said.
anyway, THANK YOU ALL for your well wishes. really.
i’m on my last shift for this week tonight, and have nothing really exciting to tell you about my own patients, but can’t quite keep the story to myself about the biggest buzz in our unit that happened while i was curled up in bed, lucky enough not to witness the whole drama unfold.
one of our patients died and it is standard procedure to contact the transplant organization when a death like this occur. unfortunately, an innocent mistake was made and the name and phone number of a wrong patient was given to the organization.
you can probably imgaine what happened next.
imagine being half asleep at 1 AM, hearing the phone ring, hearing condolences , hearing explanations why donating your loved ones eyes are the best thing you should think about after you lost your loved one.
you probably know what you’ll do next if you were that daughter/son. you’ll call the hospital, demand the story and explanation why the hospital didn’t even have the decency to inform you of your mother’s death first, before contacting the transplant organization….only to find out that your mother is all well and breathing, and the call was a terrible mistake.
you also probably know what you want to do if you were that transplant representative. you’ll probably call the hospital, demand an explanation as to why you were given the wrong name, and…
well, you imagined accurately. apparently, the phone lines were burning with angry, exasperated, apologetic, overwhelmed, tired voices that didn’t stop even when the night shift finally ended. incident reports were turned in, possible termination was discussed, sighs of disbelief were expressed, sighs of relief were anticipated, but came too late.
you see, just when you thought these kind of terribly sad, unfortunate things happen only on those ridiculously unbelievably unrealistic tv shows, you will realize that life imitates soaps, and i don’t know. the only thing i know is, it is just sad.
i feel for whoever it was who gave the wrong name and number, maybe the RN, maybe the float unit secretary. i feel for the transplant representative. i feel worst for the patient’s daughter, but…somewhere along the way, i hope there will be understanding and forgiveness. after all, everybody agreed to the fact that this mistake was never done on purpose.
i don’t know when will the tongues stop wagging, or when will the blaming game end, i just hope it never happens again.
also, i’m happy the patient who was supposedly dead was actually alive. not a lot of dead people get to live again that quick.
sorry, i didn’t mean to sound so heartless.
it’s just that i still hear the ringing,
in my ears.