I moonlight in clinics on my off weeks to help pay down debt. The doctors I fill in for are often way too coddling of their patients for my tastes. A few of them will give into any demand. In my opinion this transforms you from a physician to a prescription-writing automaton. You aren't there to be their friend, you are there to do the right thing for them, despite their objections. You can be nice about it, but stand by your training and your knowledge. That's your job. Also, it's not a fever unless it's 100.5 or greater. I don't care if you "run low," that's the cutoff.
Patient: "I've been running a low-grade fever."
Me: "What was your temperature?"
Patient: "98.8."
Me (later in same conversation): "Ok, well this seems viral to me. I think with a few days of Tylenol and rest it will pass."
Patient: "You aren't going to give me an antibiotic?"
Me: "No, it's a viral illness and you have only had symptoms for two hours."
Patient: "Well, I will just wait until my regular doctor comes back and have her give me one. I can't believe they can't find a good doctor to fill in for her."
#Ican'teither
4 comments:
Good for you for standing by your training... tossing out antibiotics for everything is not the answer!! I'm surprised the patient thought he/she knew better than you- although as an idealistic medical student, I'm sure this is more common than not.
"I'm surprised the patient thought he/she knew better than you."
I'm not. At all. Everyone is an internet doctor now. Bit of advice, throw out every ideal you had going into medical school. I stand by my affirmation that medicine is never what you think it's going to be. I liken it to The Matrix...if anyone was able to accurately describe to you what it was going to be like and make you understand, no one would ever go into medicine.
ugh! I had this one Doc who rounded in my Rehab facility, he literally gave out antibiotics if a person hit 99.9 saying he was being proactive....in what making super bugs?
#cdiff
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