How Many Doctors Does It Take…
Posted by Kirk M on 16 Jan 2007 | Tagged as: Life as a veteran
I sat in the Desk 80 waiting room reading one of my many novels whilst I waited for the specialist I was supposed to see to poke her head around the corner and call my name. Desk 80 is where all the specialists come to hang out when they finally have enough appointments to justify filling in a whole day of consultations. They all share the same 5 small examination rooms in this particular wing of the VA Medical Center in White River Junction, VT. That’s where I was today-at the VA.
I had come down to see a Gastroenterologist (gut doctor, internal medicine, that sort of thing) in hopes that some answers could be found for the problems I’ve been having in the esophageal department. The details of this longtime malady are unimportant for this particular writing except for mentioning that it is service related. Any other detail is moot at this time. It’s just that I’ve noticed a trend that’s come along every time I’m down for an appointment these days that I’d like to share with everyone.
It’s just this…
They’re all so young.
I haven’t seen a doctor yet at this particular institution of medical practice that isn’t at least twenty years my junior and more. Most of them haven’t seen thirty yet. In other words they aren’t doctors at all…they’re interns! And after asking me an hour’s worth of the same text book questions that mostly didn’t apply to my particular medical situation, this young person in a white smock, sensible shoes and name badge complete with a little photo of when they were even younger than they were now, scurries off after telling me they needed to consult with their supervisor.
Figures…
During the entire exam I swear I could just about hear the real doctor (the aforementioned supervisor) instructing them:
“If you let the patient actually start speaking without you interrupting him/her in time–listen politely, smile, nod your head and as soon as you can stop him/her from speaking any further…pick up the questions where you left off…then come see me.”
And they all have supervisors.
Their supervisor?? The last time I had a supervisor was during study period when I was in high school for heavens sakes and sometimes this little supervisory consultation takes as long as that hour’s worth of questions took in the first place. Good thing I brought a book along. I’ve read more good novels while waiting on a doctor to come back from their consultation with their supervisor then I’ve ever read on a Saturday afternoon at home.
And so the supervisor comes in. Now this is what I’ve always pictured in my mind when the word “doctor” wandered into my general vicinity. Fifty-ish, premature wrinkling from years of too much stress and too long hours, gray hair and a moustache tinged yellow around the edges from all the cigarettes he’s smoked during his medical career. He leans back against the examination table (I’m in a chair by the desk), crosses his arms and begins to speak. It takes this guy around 2 minutes to accomplish what took my specialist to achieve in an hour and I even got to put in my two cents worth while we were at it.
In about a week I should hear from the Boston VA facility for the first of three possible test dates.
This isn’t as bad as it has been though. This is just a typical example of what I usually deal with here. Once I was lying on an examination table in the emergency room at the same facility, feeling generally rotten (hernias), naked from the waist down with all my hanging gear exposed while an old, crusty hernia specialist decked out in examination gloves, well worn lab coat and an old pair of Reeboks, sternly asked his class of four future surgeons that were gathered around the table peering at my gonads; “Now when is the only time that you do not perform a rectal exam?”
The answer, interestingly enough, was when you (the future surgeons) did not have a finger or the patient did not have a rectum. Only three of them got it right. This, as you might imagine, didn’t make me feel any better.
After the mandatory rectal exam (made an even dozen that day) I spent the next 30 miserable minutes standing on a cold floor in my socks while these four wannabe saw-bones (were they even 20 years old?) poked their rude little fingers into my crotch, doing it all wrong and having the old salty surgeon himself constantly correcting them by re-demonstrating the correct way to proceed. He achieved this by repeatedly ramming of his educated finger deep into the back of my scrotum, almost lifting off my feet in the process while his loyal flock winced, whimpered and covered their eyes, all the time giving out with wise instructional verbages such as:
“Ya gotta get in there!” he says. “Ya gotta get in there deep!” he wisely howls as he pounds at my poor crotch a third time in useful demonstration. “Ya gotta move it around in there ta find it!” he loudly admonishes.
Anyway, with carefully applied psychological therapy over the next year or so, I was able to get over that exam and my homeopathic tendency to perform terminal inguinal hernia exams on every ##!!@@!! doctor that unwisely passed too close to me and hopefully this time around things won’t be quite as aggravating.
Now I wonder what she meant by the “Egg Salad Sandwich test”?
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