On a happier note....

Before you all come to the conclusion that the main focus of my blog is to simply complain about the goings on in the wonderful world of medicine and the like, I'm going to try to redeem myself here. I have had the pleasure to work with some of the most professional, courteous doctors and nurses imaginable.

Here's my "gratitude" list for docs (in no particular order):
1. Thank you for your patience when explaining or showing me how to carry out your orders when you requested that I do something I've never done before.

2. Thank you for not being short (or worse) with me on the phone in the middle of the night when I had a concern with your patient or needed to report an abnormal lab value.

3. Thank you for getting up out of your chair to assist me with a combative patient when you could have sat there and waited on someone else to do it.

4. Thank you for picking up the phone and ordering that CXR when I was the only one in the unit and the patient was critical.

5. Thank you for calling to check on your critical patient and giving me the opportunity to voice any concerns rather than telling me to call the "on-call" doc if I have any problems.

6. Thank you for taking the time to learn my name and then addressing me by it whenever we meet.

7. Thank you for realizing and acknowleging that I am doing my best for you and your patient. I can't control how quickly the lab gets your results back to me for those stat labs or what have you, but I appreciate the fact that you are not blaming me for their shortcomings.

8. Thank you for asking my humble opinion about your patient and his condition. It's nice to know that I'm thought of as a colleague with a brain, not simply as your hand-maiden.

9. Thank you for writing legibly so that I don't have to call a staff meeting to decipher your orders.

10. Thank you for returning my page promptly. If it wasn't important, I wouldn't have called you.

All in all, we are a team, you and I. Like a well-oiled machine, we work best when all the cogs are lubricated and fit into one another as a hand in glove. I need you and, like it or not, you need me. There is nothing more rewarding than working with a doctor that you have respect for and that respects you. It makes all the difference.

Okay, enough of that mushy crap...

Here's my thought for today:
"It's always darkest before dawn. So if you're going to steal the neighbor's newspaper, that's the time to do it."