Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
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My rude doctor...

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

15:17 / 06.08.02

Hokay. This funny.

I got a really frightening email from my sister the other day, telling me she'd just found out we were both in a very high-risk group for bowel cancer (my dad having been diagnosed with it at 37... apparently if they'd found it earlier he may have had a chance, rather than it getting to his lungs & brain).

Sooo... I had an appointment at the doctor's yesterday already, to get a repeat fluoxetine prescription.

Only... (and here's the funny part)- it wasn't my usual doctor. It was a different guy. As I sat down, he barked at me "SO! HOW'S THE DEPRESSION?"

Whoah. Bedside manner this was not.

Later in the session, I decided to bring up the whole bowel cancer/"sort me out with a colonoscopy" thing.

And I swear (I can't be sure, but I can't think of anything else he could have said that would have sounded AND meant the same), he said:

"I'll give your details to the ass people".

Sorry. Just needed to vent there.

Mourne Kransky

15:56 / 06.08.02

He got a Gold Star on the day they did Bedside Manner 101, obviously. Says a lot for you, Chairman M, that you can laugh at it.

Reminds me of this unexpected nugget in the otherwise bleak reportage of Harold Shipman's murder spree. One paragraph mentioned that he "could be very blunt" and, as illustration, told about him examining a patient and the son asking "How long has he got, Doctor?" Shipman sensitively said, "I wouldn't bother to buy him Easter Eggs."

As far as the other (colorectal) matter goes, my Dad has been having colonoscopies yearly since his late thirties and, at 69, still no problem there. It's wise to be safe but it is all a game of percentages.

Bill Posters

16:19 / 06.08.02

My favourite interaction with a doctor was being called a "twat" by one, to my face, but to be fair I had presented him with a parachuting-induced injury and he may well have felt I deserved all I got and was wasting NHS time.

Ganesh

16:51 / 06.08.02

I've said some fairly appalling things, but only when I've been seeing a particular patient for long enough to let the 'professional' stuff thaw a little.

Yes, that Shipman quote was funny-awful. I worked at one GP surgery that, in the wake of Harold Shipman, devised a notional 'Shipman list' - all those perpetually abusive, annoying or just plain 'heartsink' patients. "Referral to Dr Shipman?" they'd ask each other sympathetically, upon returning from a particularly trying consultation.

Hmm. In response to some of these 'doctors are crap' sentiment, perhaps I ought to start a thread on my own personal 'Shipman list'...

w1rebaby

17:35 / 06.08.02

Perhaps he was just trying to be "blokey" because he thought you'd take it better that way? In which case it was a little misjudged... or perhaps he was just a twat.

One of my friends (female) eventually plucked up the courage to see one of the university doctors about her definitely worsening depression. Unfortunately she picked one who told her to cheer up and go for a run. AFAIK she never went back. That guy was a twat, though, an old bloke who was retiring shortly and really did not give a monkey's. I saw him once or twice and afterwards made sure to emphasise that I did not want to see him whenever I returned.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

19:14 / 06.08.02

'nesh... wasn't trying to start a "doctors are crap" thing. Honest. My usual doctor is very cool indeed. Having said that, were I in the medical profession, I'm sure I'd be up for starting a "patients are wankers" thing.

Ganesh

19:17 / 06.08.02

Was actually referring to another thread, Stoatie. Think I might start an anonymised version of my own Shipman List, though, if only for venting purposes...

The Natural Way

11:29 / 07.08.02

Well, Stoat, I think the fill-in Doc sounds fantastic.

I mean, if you weren't all worked up about botty-cancer and all that....

invisible_al

16:52 / 07.08.02

You know I was going to ask you Ganesh if you'd ever wanted to refer anyone to Dr Lector

. Guess this answers my question.

Ganesh

17:05 / 07.08.02

Well, yes, the notion's always been around. For a while it was 'refer to Dr Lecter' then 'Dr Kevorkian' and now it's Shipman. Who said doctors had no sense of humour?

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