Read The Information Sheet, You Fucking Idiot!

The BBQ Pit
#1

Ok, I am a nuclear medicine tech. The last couple years I’ve been working in a cardiology clinic doing heart scans. This is a quote from the information sheet that I wrote that every patient who has this scan gets.

And yet I continue to get patients who can’t do it. Ok, first off, if you are going to die from lying flat on your back, why don’t you just fucking end it already. You’re worthless anyway.

The information sheet also says not to drink coffee before one of the tests. (Because it will keep a certain medication from working.) And yet, at least once a week I get a patient in and I can fucking smell it on their stupid asses. I ask, “Did you have coffee this morning?” Them: “Yes, a few cups.” Me: “Did you read the information sheet we gave you when you scheduled the test?” Them: “No.” Me(in my head): “I’m going to rip your fucking head off and shit down your neck you ignorant piece of crap!”

Ok, now if you were going to have a test where you were going to be injected with radioactive goo, and then have your (already fucked up) heart stressed on a treadmill wouldn’t you read the fucking information sheet???

The information sheet also says to come 15 minutes early for check in. Hey, guess what? I just had a patient come in half an hour late and expect to be done. Look, fuckstick: I see 8 patients a day. These scans take 3-3.5 hours to do. To accomplish that, each patient is stepped off half an hour. It’s like Ford’s fucking assembly line back here. Sad but true. So, sorry, but I can not fucking squeeze your stupid, delinquent ass in!

Fuckin’ bastards!

#2

Please correct me if I’m reading you wrong here, but you write in your pamphlet that patients should tell the doctor if they can’t lie down. When someone then tells the doctor that they can’t lie down, you silently cuss them out and scream that they’re worthless? Um…so why put that in the packet to begin with? Doesn’t that mean they’ve READ the packet you gave them? Nuclear medicine tech, heal thyself.

#3

I interpretted that to mean inform the doctor so other arrangement can be made before you actually show up for the appointment and waste everyone’s time.

#4

Gr8Kat is correct.

#5

Ok, this may be an ignorant sounding hijack, but what condition does someone have that keeps them from laying down ? That seemed odd to me.
On the OP, I can sympathize completely. I have dealt with people for years who are not afraid to bitch about how there stuff isn’t working to their satisfaction, yet wont spend 10 minutes reading the instructions. I’m convinced that a fair size of the population is afraid to, or even worse, just can’t read.

#6

I hear you, Democritus.
I teach school and the parents who don’t read the newsletters and calendars make me crazy.
They show up with their kid on a day we are closed, and say, “There’s no school today? Why? But no one told me school was closed today!”
Yes, we did, dumbass. It’s on the school calendar you got at the beginning of the year, it was on the monthly school-wide newsletter, AND on my weekly class newsletter.
They bitch and moan, as if they think if they complain enough, we will let them leave their kid anyway.

As a matter of fact, we are having an in-service training day next week. School will be CLOSED! It’s always kind of funny to see which parents show up…usually the same ones over and over.

#7

Some breathing conditions, like asthma, make it difficult or impossible to lay flat on one’s back and breathe at the same time. I, personally, put breathing as a VERY high priority.

#8

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Lynn Bodoni *
**

As you should. I’m sorry but I have not heard of this condition before. Live and learn. All the best to you, tho I’m sure you know how to take care of it with out my encouragement.

#9

But think of the positives of your job, Demo. When people ask what you do for a living, you get to say “I inject people with radioactive goo.” That’s gotta be worth something, right? Makes for some interesting business cards, I bet.

While I agree that you’d think it’d be in a patient’s best interest to read the information sheet (sheesh, I’ve been on the Pill for like 7 yrs and still read the packaging info every month to make sure nothing’s changed), perhaps a finger may be pointed back to the doctors themselves. I would assume they’re familiar enough with their patients limitations to know if the test is physically possible or not.

#10

Mojo, yes, Lynn is on the right track. There are all sorts of cardiac and pulmonary insufficiency problems where people have a hard time lying down flat.

Rasa: You’re damn straight! I bitch the doctors out all the time for ordering tests on patients that they know can’t handle the them. On the other hand, a lot of our patients are referred from outside the cardiology office and the referring physicians don’t always know what the test is all about. While this may sound pretty fucked up (to order a test on your patient that you don’t know about), there are thousands of diagnostic tests, and I wouldn’t expect them to understand or figure out all of them.

Too many patients think that it is only a doctor’s responsibility to take care of them and that they play no part in their own health care. This is mostly in our elderly patients who come from a time where doctors were these patriarchic (is that a word?) figures whose word you followed no matter what. Listen up, people. If you choose not to take an active role in your own health care, don’t blame anyone else if it goes awry.

#11

Wanted to post this in The Pit so you’d save us a trip?:wink:

#12

One of the mail carriers at work sprained his ankle. After a week of light duty, he went to get it checked. THAT’S when he found out he was supposed to have spent no more than 4 hours standing in a day. He spent all week casing mail, on his feet, for 8 hours. It was on the release instructions from the ER, the ones that he stuffed in his pocket AND NEVER LOOKED AT.

DUH

#13

Yes, I know it is accurate as it stands.

Trust me here, dumb it down, CAP the important parts, Stronger language, etc.

Make it all too painfully clear, stressing the points you’ve mentioned here, as in;

DO NOT expect to be accomodated if you cannot come on time. Our services are much in demand and we are very tightly scheduled.

DO NOT drink coffee before your test, 12 hrs, not any coffee, if you do we will not do the test.

If you cannot, lie flat for 3 hrs, raise your arm straight yada yada, DO NOT let your doctor send you for this test.

I was in a similar situation once, I had spelled out the instructions in the information sheet but was drowning in frustration thinking, “What, is everyone on earth an idiot?”
The words seemed painfully clear to me.

When I finally sat down and repenned it, well, the outcome changed dramatically. The whole thing changed overnight. And the difference was like night and day. But I stood by my original missive, it was direct and clear.

Oh what a change though.

Think about it, there’s a reason there are instructions on shampoo.