Sixteen days on the internal medicine wards is a long, long time. Twenty two days in a row of work without a break can be maddening. The only hopes of survival are chicken tender wraps, Dr. Pepper and patients like Ms. Nelson (not her real name, of course).
Ms. Nelson is a very pleasant, very social, very sharp-witted older woman who was admitted for routine hospitalization-type stuff. Just sick enough to need the hospital, clearly going to do well. So unlike most hospital situations, the pressure was off. The first day, we met and made the plan. The other five days of hospitalization consisted of tinkering with medication doses and waiting for the desired effect to occur
There's only so many days in a row that you can say "You're blood pressure looks good. You haven't had a fever. I think we're getting closer to sending you home." There's only so many days in a row you can hear that from your doctor. So as both doctor and patient, you look for other things to talk about. You look for things like this:
![Love Is in the Air]()
This book was on Ms. Nelson's wheeled tray that draped her hospital bed. The first day, I asked innocently enough, "what's that book about?" and she smirked, raised an eyebrow and said, "Dr. Shaftacular, you know what this book is about."
The next day I asked her if anything exciting had happened in the book thus far. She let that comment pass.
The next day I whispered to her that my intern had something really inappropriate along the lines of "that's what I look like with no shirt on." I told her I doubted it because my intern was Caucasian. Ms. Nelson said she doubted it because my intern "weighs about 125 pounds soaking wet".
The last day before discharge, I said to Ms. Nelson, "I wonder how that book ends." Without a moment's lapse, my patient snapped back, "You and I both know how this book ends."
Ms. Nelson went home in better shape than she came in. That's always the goal. It's not always the way it happens. A victory for my team and me.
The day after she discharged, my medical student handed me something and said it was a gift from Ms. Nelson.
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There it is. Physicians are ethically not allowed to accept gifts from patients. Ethics do not account for this. In case you can't tell, it's the book, with a note affixed with hospital tape. A token -- a token of great personal weight for me because it made me laugh and smile.
I'm planning to read this book. But I'm going to save it for when I'm on an airplane, next to a complete stranger in coach class. Me, a 235 pound bald thirty something Caucasian man with poor fashion sense, reading this book.
![Love Is in the Air]()
This is the stuff that gets me through the day.
Ms. Nelson is a very pleasant, very social, very sharp-witted older woman who was admitted for routine hospitalization-type stuff. Just sick enough to need the hospital, clearly going to do well. So unlike most hospital situations, the pressure was off. The first day, we met and made the plan. The other five days of hospitalization consisted of tinkering with medication doses and waiting for the desired effect to occur
There's only so many days in a row that you can say "You're blood pressure looks good. You haven't had a fever. I think we're getting closer to sending you home." There's only so many days in a row you can hear that from your doctor. So as both doctor and patient, you look for other things to talk about. You look for things like this:
This book was on Ms. Nelson's wheeled tray that draped her hospital bed. The first day, I asked innocently enough, "what's that book about?" and she smirked, raised an eyebrow and said, "Dr. Shaftacular, you know what this book is about."
The next day I asked her if anything exciting had happened in the book thus far. She let that comment pass.
The next day I whispered to her that my intern had something really inappropriate along the lines of "that's what I look like with no shirt on." I told her I doubted it because my intern was Caucasian. Ms. Nelson said she doubted it because my intern "weighs about 125 pounds soaking wet".
The last day before discharge, I said to Ms. Nelson, "I wonder how that book ends." Without a moment's lapse, my patient snapped back, "You and I both know how this book ends."
Ms. Nelson went home in better shape than she came in. That's always the goal. It's not always the way it happens. A victory for my team and me.
The day after she discharged, my medical student handed me something and said it was a gift from Ms. Nelson.
I'm planning to read this book. But I'm going to save it for when I'm on an airplane, next to a complete stranger in coach class. Me, a 235 pound bald thirty something Caucasian man with poor fashion sense, reading this book.
This is the stuff that gets me through the day.