America's Stunningly Overpriced Healthcare System In 2 Charts

[magical thyme]

89. I was very nice to him

but relieved I didn't have to actually try to draw him. He was crying and screaming "NO! NO!" when I gently probed his arm to look for a good vein. I had already let him know I wouldn't even try if I didn't find a really prominent, easy vein and promised I wouldn't make him a pin cushion. Good vein would mean a single quick try with smallest needle. No good vein, I wouldn't even try.

I can assure you that behind the scenes nobody would have had much sympathy for him. I have assisted with better behaved and more cooperative 2 year olds.

My empathy is vast with people who make the effort, but this kid was really acting more like a stuck baby than an adult having his arm gently probed for a possible vein.

I've drawn from 6 year olds who were seriously ill and very stoic after having to be drawn over and over. And I'll never forget the developmentally disabled little girl I assisted with. She was not an easy draw, but she kept her arm stock-still. Afterwards, her mother was in tears when she thanked me. So you can write what you want. Personally, meh. There are patients truly suffering who leave me in tears. Again, behind the scenes.

That said, there are other reasons you wouldn't want to be drawn in my hospital. One would be the pothead lab assistant who consistently mislabels tubes, when she doesn't leave them unlabeled somewhere. Another would be the alcoholic lead chemistry tech. Another would be the sexual harasser from the cleaning crew that a few lab assistants were encouraging, aiding and abetting by soliciting and providing him with personal information (about me). Except he finally got fired when another member of the cleaning crew alerted his manager to the fact that one night, in his determination to get my attention and set up a "date" he deliberately shoved me 4 times into my computer while I was sequentially attempt to run and result a pre-intubation critical arterial blood gas, a cord arterial and then venal blood gas for very sick neonate, a critically low potassium, and a critical post-intubation arterial blood gas. A fourth would be the porn addict they were protecting, except he became so brazen that they finally fired him. Not because ED specs were laying around un-resulted because he lost track of time while staring at female genitals on his computer screen, but because he had graduated to where he was doing it out in the open where any doctor or nurse running in from the ER might get an eyeful, which would cause trouble back at the lab chain headquarters.

And yes, I am getting out of the field. I have never worked in such an unprofessional environment as I am in at this hospital. And I've just been hired part time back to my old just in financial customer service. When I am one on one with a customer, I am able to deliver excellent customer service. I am very empathetic, but don't have a lot of tolerance for the occasional manipulators and cheaters, although I have my way of dealing with them so they 1. fail to get me to break rules for them and 2. are grateful or at least not angry by call's end. During my 1st (and last) tax season there, I won 2 quality awards and had 2 supervisor calls from customers raving about my service. Again, meh.