snippets from my day

My day started with having to have a very frank discussion with a 35 (!!) year old mom who has bad, bad cancer. Cancer that is growing and not responding to treatment. She has known about this cancer for some time, and even though it's slowly eating away at her, she stays active and happy. Happy. I left her room and wanted to cry for her.

All this week I have been dealing with a very sick patient in the ICU who I do not believe is going to get better. In fact, at this point, I feel like all the care we are providing is futile and that we are merely prolonging her death. Her family continues to hold out hope that she is going to get better and to demand that we do everything possible. They seemed to get upset with me when I told them (again) today that the patient was actually worse today than she was yesterday. I feel like I have set up an adversarial relationship with this family because of the way I tried to convey this information the first time I saw them, and now I have a hard time having a real discussion with them because they shut down with me.

Judah came and had lunch with me. He loves dipping things now, but doesn't really get that you actually take a bite of the food that is dipped. He prefers to use his dipping food like a spoon. During lunch today we sat with the husband of a resident and her 7 month old. Judah got very excited to see the baby.

My work day ended with me getting yelled at by one of the surgeons at our hospitals, because I dared to call him at 4pm on a Friday. Apparently I "need to have more respect for the specialists" who obviously are too important to work over the weekend. I got over my initial desire to cry and then wanted to reach through the phone and smack him. I will never understand why doctors feel the need to mistreat and belittle other doctors.

Thankfully the end of my work day isn't the end of the actual day. Judah was happy to see me. So was Jeff. Judah got a big kick out of watching me kiss Jeff hello and actually turned my face back toward Jeff with his hand so I'd do it again. I love that kid.

Comments

Jill Goldie said…
Aubs, sorry that the specialists there are jerks. Jason ran into that in Maine during residency. The hospital here in Asheville is so different. The specialists here are so nice to him and even thank him for calling.
10:00 AM
Anonymous said…
And I thought it was only the nurses that got the brunt of their anger. I work nights on a cardiology floor and consider it a wonderful shift when I don't have to place a call to one of our specialists. I'm not sure why people go into medicine with the expectation that their sleep will never be interrupted ...
9:14 AM
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