Bad Day

When I have a bad day, boy do I have a bad day! All of my frustration today came from the patients - EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM.

My 9am didn’t show up. Whatever, no big deal. I used the time to help other people with their things and to do a few things of my own. This wasn’t frustrating until my phone rang at 1015am. It was the front office lady at the on-call doctor’s office telling me that my 9am was standing in front of her. The patient said that she completely forgot about her appointment (which wasn’t even at that office so I don’t know why she showed up there.) The patient has an appointment to see the doctor on Tuesday the 17th and the doctors WILL NOT see the patients until I have seen them first, which means that I need to see the patient before next Tuesday. Wednesdays I don’t see patients because I do advice calls all day. Thursday and Monday I am already completely booked. Friday I see patients only in the morning, and then I use the afternoon to catch up on all of the other things I have to do. So now, because this patient is irresponsible and can’t keep her appointment, I have to mess up my schedule to squeeze her in Friday afternoon.

My 10am didn’t show up until 1022am. Normally, if a patient is 15 minutes late we WILL NOT see them – I mean come on, we have our own schedules to keep. But because she had an appointment with the doctor at 11am (which is another annoying thing because the front office people KNOW not to schedule back to back appointments like that. My appointment with the patient is 1 hour long. If she sees the doctor right after she sees me, how can I make her chart and enter all of her information into the computer in time for the doctor to have it AND still see my next patient on time?) I saw her. She was very apologetic, which made up for her being late, but I still feel like I did her a disservice – she’s pregnant with her first baby, a time when she NEEDS to hear everything I have to say to her, so I hated to rush through everything. Plus, I hate feeling rushed to make a chart and enter information into the computer. I’m afraid I’ll make a mistake or forget some vital piece of information.

My 11am didn’t show up until 1117am. By now I’m frustrated because of everything that has already happened, so when the front office people come to my office to ask me if I’ll see her I tell them no. She IS 2 minutes after the designated no-show time, after all. They go back to the front to reschedule the patient’s appointment, only to call me a minute later to tell me that by the time I have another opening in my schedule the patient will already be almost 15 weeks pregnant, which is too late to be just beginning care, which means that I HAVE to see her. I go to the front to call her back, weight her, have her pee in the cup and when we’re finally sitting in my office I tell her how important it is for her to show up to her appointments on time, as we all have our own schedules to keep and if she’s late, that makes everyone else late. Her response? A blank stare… Nice. She never even apologized after that mini-lecture. And her friend who came back with her – her cell phone rang during the appointment and you know what? SHE TOOK THE CALL! She’s sitting in my office talking on her cell phone while I’m trying to get this patient’s medical history and teach her about healthy pregnancy. I finally stopped taking to the patient, looked at the friend and said, “If you’re going to continue to interrupt my appointment with this patient, I’m going to have to ask you to step out and wait in the waiting room.” She stepped out of the office, finished her call in the hallway, and then came back in. Whatever, I didn’t say anything. She didn’t apologize either…

My 130pm I knew previously that she wasn’t going to come. I called her a while ago to move her appointment time and she told me then that she was going to go to a doctor who’s office was closer to her house. Me, being the inherently lazy person I am, didn’t take her out of the computer and open the appointment for another patient. I figured I could use the opportunity to have a nice leisurely lunch, catch up on some stuff, things like that.

My 230pm showed up at 130pm claiming nobody told her that her appointment was moved from 2pm to 230pm (this is a new thing. I used to have 1pm and 2pm appointments, but since I got my office and everyone eats lunch in it, they take lunch from 1230pm to 130pm, so my 1pm appointment wouldn’t do anymore.) I indeed called this patient to tell her that her appointment was at 230pm. I remember because I made a list of all the patients I spoke to regarding this time change. I remember her specifically because the person who answered the telephone didn’t speak English, so I had the one person in the office that speaks Spanish call again to tell the patient of the time change. That’s two of us who know the patient was told. So the patient is getting her panties in a bunch because she might have to wait an hour (remember the girl at the front doesn’t know my 130pm isn’t coming.) The front office girl comes to my office to tell me this and I admit that the 130pm isn’t coming so I took the 230pm at 130pm. So much for my leisurely lunch and catching up on stuff…

So that’s my crappy day, all caused by my patients. As Manuel so wisely pointed out to me though, I’m done with them and I never have to see them again except for in passing so I shouldn’t dwell on it too much. He’s so smart. That’s why I keep him around…