emergency room
The famed emergency room… filled with supposed hustle and bustle and renowned for the inevitable hours of waiting to actually see your physician. One of my residents busted his lip tonight, and I went with him and one of my other residents to the ER. The nurses made fleeting impressions, and the medical student, resident, and attending made lasting impressions. We first met the resident, a Dr. Nick L, soon followed by the attending Dr. B. Dr. B was quick and confident but not very reassuring. As I gain more interactions with the realm of medicine, I’ve realized that the attendings have some sort of complex that makes them more aloof and put on a pedestal above other doctors and patients. Dr. B failed to develop much of a relationship with any of us, and she worked mainly to solve the problem. While we weren’t uneasy, I didn’t feel a complete sense of trust and respect that I expect to feel from the physicians who treat me. Dr. L, the resident, tried to relate to us, but because he is a full fledged doctor who’s just begun his training to be able to actually treat anyone, he also has a complex where he’s set apart from his patients. While I do agree that a barrier must exist between doctors and patients, I don’t think that this barrier should be so obvious and inflexible. Dr. L was putting my resident’s lip under anesthesia, and honestly, it was possibly the most painful thing I’ve ever seen. He poked my resident multiple times, causing more bleeding than was actually occurring in his mouth. I was tempted many times to ask the resident to stop and have the attending treat my resident, but I also know that each resident starts out at some place and improves from there on out. Finally, we meet a medical student. I saw his badge before I saw him, and I automatically assumed that the medical student would be bumbling and shy. Instead, it turns out that Dr. Tim R (med student) is a genius MD/PhD student at Duke and graduated from TJ. Surprisingly, he was the one who checked up with my resident to see if the anesthesia was still having the desired effect. He asked us if we needed anything, and he also related to us on a much more intimate level. Perhaps being in medical school demeans you and allows you to relate to the patients, who are supposed to be the highest on the ladder but instead, are often treated as if we know nothing and care about nothing. Anyway, it surprised me the most that the best care we received today wasn’t from real physicians, but instead from a physician in training.
