“It is much more important to know what sort of a patient has a disease than what sort of a disease a patient has.” - Sir William Osler






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Tired, So Tired

This is Day 6 of seven days as hospitalist. Under our current system, this means that I spend half-days in the office seeing patients and the other half as the roving internist, seeing patients and doing admissions. It is magically designed to piss everybody off. The patients are upset because I'm working half days and can't fit them in for appointments, I'm late returning their phone calls because I've got to bail out at noon to get to the hospital, and the docs are upset because I'm not seeing their patients fast enough (hello? I'm not in the hospital at ten in the morning, you idiot, I'm in the office!) I feel like I've got one foot on the floor and one foot on a skateboard, and the skateboard is slipping out from under me. A most undignified position.

I will have to spend this weekend picking up the pieces. Mother's Day will be reduced to a ritual phone call, I'm afraid - fortunately Mom is visiting my sister out of state, so the onus is on my sister to come up with a good gift idea this time (I've done it the last several years). V.'s son is celebrating his First Communion this weekend, and I am really looking forward to seeing him in his new white suit (all the girls have to wear white dresses and the boys white suits; I suggested adding a top hat and tap shoes to the ensemble but was voted down).


posted by Dr. Alice at #