Wallet card that’s a mini-copy of their license. (I have these, and I’m not even a physician.) It’s done to make things convenient if you work off-site and don’t or can’t take your wall license with you; it also works for beauticians, accountants, funeral directors, etc. and even locksmiths in some states. (Threadjack: In Illinois, the state disciplinary action website has an extremely high number of locksmiths, usually because they didn’t inform the board of their criminal records. There are even more entries for them than there are for nurses or cosmetologists, which wouldn’t be surprising because there are so many of them.)
ETA: This was definitely the case for my old neighbor, who was an honor student in her senior year of high school who had never gotten into any kind of real trouble, and her parents figured out what was going on before she did.
If there’s a guy lying on the ground in need of immediate medical attention, and there’s another guy who claims to be a doctor trying to give him aid, I for one am certainly not going to be in the doctor’s face demanding he show me some ID that I wouldn’t even know how to evaluate.
I don’t carry a copy of my medical license, and am not under the impression that many doctors do. I also don’t have a hospital ID with me unless I am traveling to or from work. I do have a PDF copy of my license (full and wallet size) in my email, but AFAIK spending two minutes finding and opening it is not part of the current CPR algorithm.
I don’t know of any doctors who carry their license around. I’m pretty sure I don’t have any mini license version of it. Like Shmendrik I also could possibly google up some sort of proof but I don’t have anything immediate.
As far as the medically moronic media moments, pretty much any medicine on TV. It’s much easier to list what they get right than what is wrong.
I was watching that episode with one of my sisters, an MD. She’s the one who caught it.
In any random place, you’d be more likely to encounter a nurse or an EMT or paramedic than a physician.
Many doctors don’t work in hospitals, and of those who do, many don’t carry the ID with them everywhere.
Two doctors in this thread plus the 3 doctors I’ve polled IRL say they don’t carry any sort of license with them.
Exactly - is AnnieXmas claiming if she sees someone requiring medical aid lying in the street, she’ll stand over him demanding ID from anyone trying to help?
I’ve been in that situation: I witnessed an accident, and I was still in the step of “assess the situation” when someone else came up and said “Outta my way, I’m a doctor”. So, I outta’ed her way. And by that point, someone else was already calling 911, so there wasn’t anything left for me to do.
As it happened, she didn’t do anything different from what I would have done, which (in this situation) mostly amounted to telling everyone else not to do anything, and waiting for the ambulance. But if there had been something else to do, I figure she would have known it a lot better than me.
Is it medically moronic to think you could read ancient script from a burn in some guys hand? At least read it accurately enough to create a pole which, taken to some pristine-clean model of an ancient Egyptian city buried underground because whatevs, tells you where the Ark of the Covenant should be located?*
Asking for a friend.
(*Except he only burned one hand. Should’ve grabbed the other side too, apparently.)
I’m pretty sure you could have that level of detail in a brand - whether someone could actually hold a red hot medallion (to take a random example) steady and long enough to get a readable impression doesn’t seem like a medical question to my mind, though.
It was some pretty small script, though. The level of detail in what was surely a 2nd-degree burn would have to be pretty fine, far higher than in a typical cattle brand (which tend to be distinct shapes, and not words).
Also, the fact that it was a burn makes it a medical question, imho. Can a burn injury heal into readable, small-scripted Aramaic (it’s always Aramaic, isn’t it?) into someone’s palm?
When my Grandpa was in the hospital, we were sitting around with him and that machine with the heartbeat line on it turned into a flatline. We all thought that meant he had just straight-up died right then and there. He hadn’t.
Both states in which I am licensed (and the 3rd state where I used to be licensed) send out a wallet card with the license renewal, and I’ve always speculated that most of them end up trashed, shredded, or recycled. I still put mine in my wallet because that’s its intended purpose.
Care to elaborate? I’m pretty sure that actual asystole is not good. I assume you mean that a contact came loose or something?
This reminds me of the opening credits for the sitcom Scrubs. Apparently an X-ray was shown in the opening credits backwards until they finally did a special shoot of the credits where a guest star turned it around.
I guess I’m an outlier, since I carry a couple mini-license cards in my wallet. No one has ever asked to see one :(, even the time I volunteered to provide medical assistance on a commercial flight.
The first thing I thought of when I saw “medically moronic media moments” was all the times news stories breathlessly announce the findings of a new study without putting it into context (failing to indicate that it’s at odds with other, comprehensive studies, not mentioning the need to replicate it on a large scale, omitting commentary from experts in the field etc.).
After Mickey Mantle’s liver transplant, one of the doctors spoke to a press conference of medical and sports reporters. He mentioned that the liver donor had also provided various organs including two kndneys to other patients.
One of the reporters asked about the donor’s condition.
The doctor did a double-take and then responded, “You’re one of the sports reporters, right?” 
No, but a bunch of doctors ran in and did a bunch of stuff and he didn’t die right then. We had all thought that dialtone = death.