I would not want to be a doctor or a nurse!

Question:

The Emergency room I went to yesterday was so packed, and on the radio today, the hospitals have announced a plea for people to go to private care, or 24-hr clinics or CLSC’s – the ER’s are packed to 178% capacity. The doctors and nurses (who were exceedingly polite and nice to me yesterday) must have it up to their wazoos with patients – they must look at them as a myriad of bugs crawling around, squeeking, and pleading for any kind of crumb available from their benevolent presence.  Argh – they must hate us – can’t say I blame them. I actually feel embarrassed to have gone but they assured me that lithium toxicity is a legitimate reason for concern.  There were people there in wheelchairs, and braces; people who looked really ill, and one who seemed to be in a tardive dyskinesia state, too agitated to sit, to agitated to stand — ugh, the humanity. Squiggles

Response:

> The doctors and nurses (who were exceedingly polite > and nice to me yesterday) must have it up to their > wazoos with patients – they must look at them as a > myriad of bugs crawling around, squeeking, and pleading > for any kind of crumb available from their benevolent > presence.  Argh – they must hate us – can’t say > I blame them.

 No …no hate here at all.

Response:

snip > or CLSC’s – the ER’s are packed to 178% capacity. > The doctors and nurses (who were exceedingly polite > and nice to me yesterday) must have it up to their > wazoos with patients – they must look at them as a > myriad of bugs crawling around, squeeking, and pleading > for any kind of crumb available from their benevolent > presence.  Argh – they must hate us – can’t say > I blame them.

right now the blame lies in vile, penny-pinching misanthropes who have been assigned over the years to the over-administration of the health care system. these administrators detest the people in the system and would rather watch a child die than spend money needed to properly care for them. expediency sometimes indicates that money will be "saved" by closing hospital beds – and if someone dies because an ambulance has to travel further to another hospital … well, that’s alright – it probably was their time anyway. WRONG. we have the resources in this country to completely restore our health care system – not frivolously, but in such a way that there are enough mri machines, ct scanners, pet scanners AND open operating rooms – so that there aren’t waiting lists for surgeries like heart surgery – or any operation that deemed necessary by a physician (i am not talking about "elective" plastics, or minor procedures – but the ones that have 3-6 month waiting lists now). while you have pointed out an extremely valid issue in the canadian health system, squiggles, i must strongly take issue with the idea that doctors or nurses hate their patients – i have yet to encounter a doctor or nurse who is anything less than supremely professional in their approach to the care of their patients (some that are definitely better than others, yes – but NEVER one that displays contempt for their patient that could be construed as any form of hatred). hating the SYSTEM, otoh, is an entirely different matter – and i have discussed this matter with many health professionals – the consensus being that there is much to be saved, and it is a system WORTH saving, but – and this is a BIG but, public health, in canada, needs to be treated as a resource – NOT as something that does not give us anything in return for the monies which are put into the system. presently in ontario the situation in the emergency rooms is similar to that in quebec. in toronto there was a report just today about emergency services units that are having to stay with patients for upwards of three HOURS after delivering them to metro toronto hospitals because there aren’t available beds – something the provincial government had said would be remedied. the problem with health funding is that it is looked at with the same paradigm as any other investment – and that type of assessment DOES NOT work – investing in our health infrastructure is something that must be done to preserve the system and it will, ultimately, save money on long-term palliative care in the future (when combined with education/nutrition/pre-natal & neo-natal care and ongoing care throughout life that is preventative, as opposed to being interceptive. intervention is expensive – presenting at the hospital with something that has developed over months or years is much more difficult to treat, and is more expensive – but prevention, WHEN possible (obviously it isn’t, at the moment, possible for everything) will greatly reduce health care costs. we are already seeing the effects of this on our society through the extended ages and better health of our senior population. thanks to increased awareness around nutrition, physical activity and other factors, the national average is getting older – and staying healthier. something to keep in mind. however – if we do not invest wisely into the health care system NOW there will not be anything to take care of this present generation when it reaches it’s golden age – and that would be a tragedy that we cannot even begin to measure right now. take care. sj —

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