Caffeine Free in Med 3

I have a name. Use it.

I doubt any actual doctors read this, but if you become a doctor and you decide to introduce someone to a patient, call them by their name. Not a name you made up, but their actual name. Particularly the one that is probably listed on their uniform or their ID badge if they happen to be an employee.

So I was taking a patient history and actually came upon some pertinent facts that had been missed in the original H&P. I had spent a good 15-20 minutes with the patient and had built a pretty good rapport. I'm just a med student so I introduce myself to everyone by my first name. Well, a doctor saw me and pulled me out of the patient's room because it was late. I shared my knowledge that actually got a diagnosis for the patient and led to an eventual discharge.

Now, most people would be happy about that - unless, of course, said doctor puts you back in the room that where you were just taking a history, introduces you by the wrong name, and then leaves you with the patient to explain his illness. This wouldn't have been an issue if
A)my name weren't written on both my white coat and my ID
B)I hadn't just spent a bunch of time w/the patient
C)the doctor hadn't been on my team for 1 week

I felt pretty disrespected and belittled. On one hand the doctor was expressing his confidence in my skills, while undermining it by failing to treat me like a colleague. It made both the doctor and myself look bad, since the patient was not only aware of my name, since I had told him it earlier, he couldread it!

When I'm feeling a bit sad about med school, or bordering a TINY bit on bitter, I like to read SDN and Panda. I'm not alone.

And knowing that is half the battle. Well, maybe 10 percent. Or 4/32nds. Something like that.

posted by Allie @ 8:51 PM