The Fearsome Hospital Companions

 I have one admitted patient in the entire hospital. She's a 3 year old female daughter of a dentist.

Two nurses went with me during my rounds. So that the patient's overall all plans and instructions be discussed with them and carried out without hitches.


If I were a consultant in a training hospital or a medical center, doctors-in-training would be swarming all over during my rounds for lecture ,or,  just for plain learning experience... I am a senior pediatrician after all. I guess I could teach them a trick or two.

(Eh, I'm not in a training hospital...in fact ,if the nurses cannot insert intravenous catheter to the patient...there's nobody else to do it...just me. Which ,btw, my predecessors and their predecessors before them never do...they'd call the senior resident to do it for them... I'd love to have my own residents too)

I knocked on the door without really expecting to be waited upon ,but just the same, I entered the door with a big smile on my face. I came to see their daughter sick with typhoid fever.

As I was doing my physical exam to her baby, the dentist was hovering above me. She was asking a lot of questions too. She was worried about her baby girl.

All her questions were easy to answer. What was different from other parents is the fact that they were asking for the "incubation period" for this condition.

I couldn't help but smile...if I was a doctor who never did her homework... I'd be in hot waters...

I think ,all the time I was inside their room, I was palpitating. I was trying to explain her baby's condition in layman's term but changing other terms that would sound not really impressive ,but merely ,what this dentist could have seen in her readings during her dental school days. (Which, I admit ,makes it technically hard!....bummer...)

I told the nurses to see them often enough if they needed something.

I'd rather have five regular patient than one with a parent who works in the allied medical field...like a nurse, another doctor, a pharmacist or in this case, a dentist.

I think, I was also having hot flushes while explaining. I think she was quizzing me...the case was easy. But I was honestly waiting for the parents to ask me if this case was unmanageable and that they are opting to transfer to Manila or America...

Hahaha...

I'd be very encouraging...off you go...no arguments here...

So...

When both vlad's parents were admitted for viral infection at Manila east medical center.  Vlad and I traveled all the way from Baler to visit them.

We did not introduce ourselves as doctors. (We might inflict fear...hahaha )

We did not demand to see the doctor right away...(Although, we had a couple of those in our dealings.)

We did not hover. We merely sit side by side and patiently waited for their doctor to make his rounds.

While the pulmonologist was talking with mama, I can see that their encounter is not going anywhere prosperous...because like many sick senior citizens. She could not begin to explain what her problems are.

I began explaining what I think mama's other problems are...recurrent cough, phlegm more than 3 months a year, easy fatiguebility, I think she has copd. I was talking with certainty.

With that, although the doctor was smiling. He asked if we were doctors.

I apologized for not introducing ourselves. (Thought i was not ! )

I admitted that I was a pediatrician and , that he ,while pointing to vlad, was a surgeon. ( He has a pair of doctors for an audience...mwahahaha...)

The pulmonologist looking tired and weary released a big sigh and replied that we should have introduced ourselves sooner, so he wouldn't feel like a newbie facing a panel of doctors defending his diagnosis in a revalida exam in medical school.
Hahaha...

For that feeling we apologize deeply. We hate feeling that way too...

We now qualify as the usual case, but with difficult to deal with companions.

Hahaha...

Our parents will be endorsed to all shifts of nurses. And included in their anecdotal log book for having a funnily scary companions.

Long after the pulmonologist went out, a nurse came back...she was addressing us doctor and doctora....hahaha...for a moment ,I really thought I was back at our turf Baler and she was going to ask me for the next iv fluid to follow for one of my patients...

Give me a break!