What I Hate About Pediatrics: The Esoterics

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J-Rad

J-Rad

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I love pediatrics and I don't think I would have been happy in any other field. But most people don't love everything about their chosen profession, so to allow a little venting, especially for the interns who are still slogging away at their first few (most painful) months of residency I thought I'd start a few threads about the things we individually hate about pediatrics.
Have a little fun with these threads and for those who get offended too easily, lighten up.

Topic of this one: What are the esoteric things that you hate about pediatrics? Don't do specific specialties, the other thread is for that.

I don't have the energy to expend on a full list right now, but her are a few of mine:

1. (Particularly with inpatients) parental babysitting. Oh, hay-zeus christos. You admit a kid to the ward and who are you taking care of the most? The parent(s). I don't mean in a "family-centered care" kind of way, I mean the watch out for Mom having a g-damned nervous breakdown because her kid got admitted for some kind of semi-nothingburger kind of way. Seriously, if I just told you that your 2 week old has true and true meningitis with bacteria seen in the tap the ER did and, oh, I think that was a seizure you were describing; please, by all means, break down and you have my heartfelt sympathy. But if your baby got admitted for a bili of 18 and is doing otherwise really well? Well Dad, I'm happy to hold your hand for the initial shock of the admission, but can we not go too crazy? No offense, but that chemo kid with the fungus has my sphincter tone a little higher than your, generally, healthy baby.
2. And that brings up another the thing... the way we treat stuff. How many babies do we keep extra nights in the nursery or readmit to the hospital or even admit to the NICU to get our double barrels exchange transfusion shotgun ready to prevent those 6 cases of kernicterus in this country per year? I'm not necessarily griping that we do it, but rather that we are in essence forced to do it by a lack of clear evidence or direction. But such is the nature of peds (I think more so than in other specialties, acknowledging that other specialties face this conundrum as well)
3. Again not necessarily unique to peds, but I think more acutely seen in peds (I presume due to the higher discomfort level with kids): The lying ED doc. No, I'm not talking the doc who oversells or undersells the sick kid (the former may be a little bit of manipulation but often both are just due to less facility with the younger crowd), I'm talking about the EP who tells you an out-and-out lie to get a kid admitted or just to be pissy. I admitted a kid once who got billed to me a having a seventh or eighth febrile seizure and whose Mom was "insisting" on admission for observation. OK. Mom gets to me asking peavishly why I insisted that the patient get admitted. Never had a seizure. History revealed pretty mild asthma exacerbation (yeah, I don't know why that one got missed). It was amazing how much better the patient felt when she got a few puffs of albuterol via MDI. Bastard. For all the stupid calls we may get, I give the ED a lot of credit for appropriately sending a whole bunch of kids home that I never hear about. But don't freakin' lie to me to get a stupid admission because you're a dope who can't get a history.
That's enough for me for now.
 
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4. I hate that most everyday I see a parent who shouldn't be entrusted with goldfish, much less another human being. I hate that for that child's sake, I have to make their wacky, self-inflicted issues my personal problems. I hate that you can make up a "fever" and get your chronic CVL-dependent kid admitted when you want a free weekend to go out. I hate that you called to ask when the SSI check is coming while your crack baby daughter is still on a vent in the NICU. I hate that I have to explain to CPS (and possibly a jury) that you tied up your MR son to a tree outside Doberman-style. I hate that because of your outrageous litigious threats and attention-seeking calls to the media, your son is now treated with "customer service" instead of medical judgement. His life is now in the hands of a *****(you). Congratulations.

Obviously, these are some my worst experiences, but J-rad's right - it does feel good to vent. The good news for me is that for every sad example of the above, I'll meet a dozen parents that restore my faith in humanity.
 
I hate seeing kids who are completely f'ed and there's nothing anyone can do about it.
 
oompaloompa said:
4. I hate that most everyday I see a parent who shouldn't be entrusted with goldfish, much less another human being. I hate that for that child's sake, I have to make their wacky, self-inflicted issues my personal problems. I hate that you can make up a "fever" and get your chronic CVL-dependent kid admitted when you want a free weekend to go out. I hate that you called to ask when the SSI check is coming while your crack baby daughter is still on a vent in the NICU. I hate that I have to explain to CPS (and possibly a jury) that you tied up your MR son to a tree outside Doberman-style. I hate that because of your outrageous litigious threats and attention-seeking calls to the media, your son is now treated with "customer service" instead of medical judgement. His life is now in the hands of a *****(you). Congratulations.

Obviously, these are some my worst experiences, but J-rad's right - it does feel good to vent. The good news for me is that for every sad example of the above, I'll meet a dozen parents that restore my faith in humanity.
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Wait, are you training in my program? 😉
 
C'Mon people, nobody wants to complain but the few of us??!? Gripers unite!! I can't stand any more interview/can I get into/what's a "competetive" program/what does a cardiologist make threads. Buck up and startchyer whinin'!
 
dtreese said:
I hate seeing kids who are completely f'ed and there's nothing anyone can do about it.
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...Care to elucidate more on that?
I guess I should explain more myself, if you're a pediatric it's your job to make sure the kid is NOT f***ed up.
x0x0
 
Many a time you really can't stop the express train to F'd-up City. They're going to get there one way or another. I'm going into path, but my peds rotation was enough to show me that I would probably be an incarcerated pediatrician for being the first to take a tire iron to a ******ed mother's head.

The case that did it for me was this: An older spooky looking woman walks in with 4 kids and none of them even look alike...not even the same skin tone. I'm handed their charts, all with different last names (I go to the receptionist and am assured that its not an error). Turns out that the only thing the kids share in common is their biological mother, in jail of course, as are the separate father's of each of the kids. They were all there that day to be followed up for ridiculously high blood lead levels...so high infact that the clinic was audited by the state. The spooky woman is the kid's maternal grandmother and she's off the wall batty. She constantly asks us about CPS paperwork and how she's taking such good care of them. I look at the one I'm supposed to examine with my attending there to deflect sensitive questions and as I'm looking in the kid's ear there's a foreign object in there. After a good 20 minutes we remove a piece of a toy that this kid stuck in there. Not the kid's fault really because he's so developmentally delayed that the best we can expect out of him is to give advanced warning of bowel movements. His step-brothers are in better off shape, but not by much.

Its crap like that where I wonder where the future of humanity is. Ever watch Idiocracy? We may actually be peering into the future with that movie.
 
Alteran said:
Many a time you really can't stop the express train to F'd-up City. They're going to get there one way or another. I'm going into path, but my peds rotation was enough to show me that I would probably be an incarcerated pediatrician for being the first to take a tire iron to a ******ed mother's head.

The case that did it for me was this: An older spooky looking woman walks in with 4 kids and none of them even look alike...not even the same skin tone. I'm handed their charts, all with different last names (I go to the receptionist and am assured that its not an error). Turns out that the only thing the kids share in common is their biological mother, in jail of course, as are the separate father's of each of the kids. They were all there that day to be followed up for ridiculously high blood lead levels...so high infact that the clinic was audited by the state. The spooky woman is the kid's maternal grandmother and she's off the wall batty. She constantly asks us about CPS paperwork and how she's taking such good care of them. I look at the one I'm supposed to examine with my attending there to deflect sensitive questions and as I'm looking in the kid's ear there's a foreign object in there. After a good 20 minutes we remove a piece of a toy that this kid stuck in there. Not the kid's fault really because he's so developmentally delayed that the best we can expect out of him is to give advanced warning of bowel movements. His step-brothers are in better off shape, but not by much.

Its crap like that where I wonder where the future of humanity is. Ever watch Idiocracy? We may actually be peering into the future with that movie.
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That thought scares the he## out of me on a daily basis...🙁
 
I get really down on attendings who have been "good" their whole lives and have no idea how to talk to or deal with an adolescent who is doing fairly normal adolescent things. We get frustrated with them, for sure, but guess what, it's developmentally appropriate for them to take risks.
 
J-Rad said:
The USN's greatest secret is that the Magic Miracle Wand is not reposited in DC, but rather in humble Portsmouth, VA. 😀
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I don't get it..........
 
J-Rad said:
The USN's greatest secret is that the Magic Miracle Wand is not reposited in DC, but rather in humble Portsmouth, VA. 😀
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I don't get it either, but I do hate Portsmouth...

What irks me greatly is the number of parents who get their kid up at 3 AM and come to the ER with either a cold or a chronic problem, like abdominal pain that's been going on for the past three weeks. Oh and they have an appointment with GI the next day, but why can't I call them in now? Plus they're always pissed about waiting and then even angrier that there's nothing you can do for them other than reassurance. Seriously, in the ER your job is tell them what they don't have, not what they do have.

Oh yeah, and the parent almost always demands major tests. They want CTs, MRIs when they're totally not warrented. Or they demand antibiotics. You're just there as a drive through service, not a care provider.
 
Stitch said:
I don't get it either, but I do hate Portsmouth...

What irks me greatly is the number of parents who get their kid up at 3 AM and come to the ER with either a cold or a chronic problem, like abdominal pain that's been going on for the past three weeks. Oh and they have an appointment with GI the next day, but why can't I call them in now? Plus they're always pissed about waiting and then even angrier that there's nothing you can do for them other than reassurance. Seriously, in the ER your job is tell them what they don't have, not what they do have.

Oh yeah, and the parent almost always demands major tests. They want CTs, MRIs when they're totally not warrented. Or they demand antibiotics. You're just there as a drive through service, not a care provider.
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Pretty much all the points that make me certain EM is not for me. It's hard enough explaining to Johnny's mom why he doesn't need antibiotics for the sniffles. When Johnny's mom is pissed she showed up at 10pm on Saturday on the 2nd day of symptoms, it's even harder.

And then there's the guy with the nasty ingrown toenails who has missed 2 podiatry appointments and shows up on Christmas Eve so I can remove them for him.
 
Stitch said:
I don't get it either, but I do hate Portsmouth...

What irks me greatly is the number of parents who get their kid up at 3 AM and come to the ER with either a cold or a chronic problem, like abdominal pain that's been going on for the past three weeks. Oh and they have an appointment with GI the next day, but why can't I call them in now? Plus they're always pissed about waiting and then even angrier that there's nothing you can do for them other than reassurance. Seriously, in the ER your job is tell them what they don't have, not what they do have.

Oh yeah, and the parent almost always demands major tests. They want CTs, MRIs when they're totally not warrented. Or they demand antibiotics. You're just there as a drive through service, not a care provider.
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Be nice, P-Town isn't all that bad 😀 (I did always wonder if those people running around w/ "P-Town" bumber stickers realized that P-Town to a lot of people in the Northeast is Provincetown. Nice place, but quite known for a particular characteristic not looked on favorably in the Bible Belt)

~0300 in a certain ED that Stitch is familiar with: Mother (who had most definitely been waiting for a good few hours as the night had been busy until then) and 14 day old baby-"My baby not going doo doo".
"Never?"
"No not never, but she grunts and makes faces a lot when she tries"
Ahh, saving lives one doo doo goin' baby at a time

BTW the "inside joke" isn't that secret or interesting: Homunculus trained at the DC Military Pediatrics residency. In an intersting irony, that is home of one of the Services' neonatology fellowships and also to the Heme/Onc fellowship but lowly Portsmouth Naval actually has a busier NICU and Heme/Onc service, and I believe, a larger patient base than the DC area program-but is so much less known that there was a thread a few months before that intimated that the ONLY military PH/O center on the east coast was in DC (http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=518020&highlight=pediatric). Sorry, not an interesting or good one-Homunculus himself probably looked at and said "I wonder what the hell he was talking about"🙂
 
More stories:

I got called to the ER because a 9 month old patient was sent there by the daycare for bad diaper rash (why won't that mom take care of her kid?) and some suspicious greenish /purple bruises on the inside of it's thighs.

I look: diaper-rash=nystatinize that sucker
Bruises= match the ink in the diaper pattern. Aplly rubbing alcohol to bruises, bruises wash away.

Moral of the story: 1) always try to wash off bruises 2) diaper rash is not indicative of child mistreatment

I get tired of knowing more about kids than granny, but getting ignored by Granny because I didn't see the first Great Depression. Sure, castor oil and epicac might have been the recommended treatment once. But, you know what? I know more about the bilirubin cycle than you do. Please let me explain it.
 
The enmeshed mother with the teenage daughter with one or more difficult to treat diseases with a strong psychogenic component +/- some other more "organic" disease. The teenager has IBS, CFS, POTS (postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome) in my world, or something else. Mom's anxiety makes your stomach knot with the vibes she sends hurtling across the room. These dynamic duos are some of the most likely to not want to go home if admitted and have a negative workup and no more active symptoms. This has to be a symbiotic disease process all of its own. Anybody have one or more of these?
 
BigNavyPedsGuy said:
Yeah, and you're right. It does tend to be teenage girls. I've also seen the crazy mom make the 11 year boy so anxious he immediately began wretching.
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There are these "famous" patients that every single member of the health care team knows because they've been around so much, and when they call/ visit/ get admitted, it creates a sense of disappointment among the people who are in clinic/ on call that day (maybe because the patient is still not better...?). Every practice has similar ones, I believe, you can't get away from them.
Do you guys have the impression, too, that these mothers tend to have very strong opinions about their doctors (either love them or hate them)? If you're new on the team, you may feel like they're trying to manipulate you, and it takes some practice to not give in and still keep them interested in working with you.
It's hard for the kid to (want to) get better though in this co-dependency kind of constellation.
As hard as it may sound, I think it's worthwhile to consider the customer-service climate of today's medical world as a factor that enables them to get lots and lots of rewards for what may be a subconscious attention seeking behavior (in addition to parent-child separation issues). The more you whine, the more somebody will talk with you about yourself, run tests for you, and rack his brains about your case.
 
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Yes, while there is no single prototype for these families, the Mom's often are notorious splitters, and scream out "Borderline" when the hair on the back of your neck stands up. And since they are often seeking the care of multiple subspecialists, care often gets fragmented. They seem to be very invested in their child having a disease and are often disappointed and downright angry that someone would dare intimate that their child was healthy. Definitely one of the most difficult situations.
 
J-Rad said:
The enmeshed mother with the teenage daughter with one or more difficult to treat diseases with a strong psychogenic component +/- some other more "organic" disease. The teenager has IBS, CFS, POTS (postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome) in my world, or something else. Mom's anxiety makes your stomach knot with the vibes she sends hurtling across the room. These dynamic duos are some of the most likely to not want to go home if admitted and have a negative workup and no more active symptoms. This has to be a symbiotic disease process all of its own. Anybody have one or more of these?
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My least favorite patient to see. In fact, the patient set that has driven me away from GI. There are far too many of those consults in GI for my tastes.
 
Freibi said:
As hard as it may sound, I think it's worthwhile to consider the customer-service climate of today's medical world as a factor that enables them to get lots and lots of rewards for what may be a subconscious attention seeking behavior (in addition to parent-child separation issues). The more you whine, the more somebody will talk with you about yourself, run tests for you, and rack his brains about your case.
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I couldn't agree more. All this autonomy and self determination crap has really just breeded a culture of "I can Google something on the interwebs and manage my own care. My doctor has to order everything I want." I want patients that are informed, and I don't mind discussion, but don't treat me like a drive through service.

If I had to do general peds, I'd do boutique medicine. Hand pick my patients, eliminate the crazy ones and be there for them.

And J-Rad, the teenage girls are definitely the worst. My best friend and roommate from residency made a pact never to date someone who sees a neurologist or a GI specialist... It's just code for psych.
 
1. Parents who insist that they must be allowed to watch their child undergo a procedure.

One of my residents was kind enough to provide me with a "rule of thumb" for this scenario. She told me, "Never allow a parent to watch a procedure. They will pass out." I have since made a concerted effort to follow this rule whenever I have been allowed to do a procedure, and have always taken time to kindly explain to parents why they cannot be present (in the event that my resident has not already done so).

Most parents have been understanding. One mother, in fact, admitted to me that she passes out fairly easily, and appreciated my concern for her own well-being. However, I have dealt with 2-3 parents who refused to accept what they were told. One such parent even went so far as to complain to my attending, because my resident asked her (nicely) to leave her child's room prior to an LP.

2. Being "hit on" by a patient's (single) mother.

I'm a 26-year-old, single male, which has it's advantages and disadvantages. One such disadvantage was brought to light this past June, at which time I was completing an Ambulatory Pediatrics elective.

My preceptor and I had finished seeing his patients early on this particular day, and so I volunteered to see a patient being followed by the other attending who was working in clinic that morning. She and I had worked together several times before, and so she had no problem with me seeing one of her patients- a 5-year-old boy presenting for a well-child check-up.

My visit with the patient, in and of itself, went well. As expected, he was healthy and was scheduled to be starting kindgarten in a few months. I asked him if he had any big plans for the summer. He excitedly told me that he would be visiting Six Flags with his grandparents. Oh, to be five-years-old again 😀.

His mother, meanwhile, could not take her eyes off of me. Initially, I had thought that she was the type of person who always asked a lot of questions, but as time passed, her questions became more and more personal. Though it's possible she was simply trying to be nice, her behavior seemed too friendly. She was talking to me as though I were an old friend she hadn't seen in a while, as opposed to a fourth-year medical student.

Whether my attending noticed any of this, I don't know, and I didn't feel the need to share it with her. The experience didn't bother me that much, as it's highly unlikely that I'll see this woman again. Even so, I thought the rest of you might find amusment in this story.

In retrospect, the question begs asking: do these single mothers not realize that we're on to them? One of my classmates had a similar experience, and it seems clear that single mothers seem to view aspiring male pediatricians as a potential "gold-mine," as my friend as eloquently put it. 🙂

Thoughts?
 
To paraphrase the Patch Adams movie: "Let's go down to Labor and Delivery - you know those girls put out..." Get it where you can!
 
TeleoDeum said:
To paraphrase the Patch Adams movie: "Let's go down to Labor and Delivery - you know those girls put out..." Get it where you can!
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I thought about that, but there seems to be something "off" about people who go to the doctor to find a date, as though they can't find one elsewhere.
 
Stitch said:
And J-Rad, the teenage girls are definitely the worst. My best friend and roommate from residency made a pact never to date someone who sees a neurologist or a GI specialist... It's just code for psych.
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I tend to agree. One particular case comes to mind that went above and beyond - this 16 yo girl with CF and cyclic vomiting. So just to break that down:
1) white teenage girl
2) chronic disease since birth
3) GI symptoms

That's pretty much the holy trinity of crazy.

Also there's this - have you ever had a case where you think that even a chronic kid would be overall okay if their mom wasn't cat-lady crazy? Case in point, two 17 yo guys with Crohn's of similar severity were on our GI service at roughly the same time. One mom was certainly brighter but also calmer more down to earth. She made her son do all his schoolwork and didn't let him feel sorry for himself. This year he's during well in college and is one of my favorite paramedics here. Here's a random sampling of the antics of the other mom:
- she demanded Ativan whenever her son dared to argue with her (unfortunately she often got it)
- for a solid month inpatient she had been giving him "alternative" treatments without telling anyone (some of them borderline poisonous e.g. laetrile)
- she brought kittens (plus litterbox) in his hospital room and refused to remove them (security involved)

Now this timid, sweet kid is completely f*cked despite a potentially controllable illness. He'll never leave home, get a job, or even get laid. I'm telling you CMS (Crazy Mom Syndrome) has the poorest prognosis of any other condition I've come across, whether the kid just has a runny nose or hypoplastic left heart.
 
First of all, lets be honest, the GI service is the DUMP service of the hospital. Abdominal pain? you must need a scope! Didn't see anything? Aww....s&*T

The "Holy Trinity" that oompaloompa speaks of is something I continue to refer to as the "Turf Triad", as in "How in god's name can I quickly turf this to another service, because if i have to deal with this whiny pain in the a$% teenager for the next week I might come in one day with a noose around my neck asking one of my co-interns to snug it nice and tight".

Stitch, one of our combined ward teams takes care of both the neuro & GI inpatient services, and the sign next to the white board that says "Tips for Interns", #1 in BIG letters is "Know who their psychiatrist is!" 😀

Left Ventricle: like it or not, most hospitals that have "family based" care allow parents to watch procedures. You just can't let it bother you...case in point, i did an LP on a kid earlier this year that went very well (except for the 4 RBCs...damn!), and right as I was finished the mom asked me how many of those I had done, and I told her honestly this was only my 3rd one this year, and her jaw fell...but because i was calm, she never knew, and her child's LP was successful 🙂

Oh, and J-Rad, How bout the 14 year old female with syncope? Enjoying it yet? :laugh:
 
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CrazyPeds527 said:
Left Ventricle: like it or not, most hospitals that have "family based" care allow parents to watch procedures. You just can't let it bother you...case in point, i did an LP on a kid earlier this year that went very well (except for the 4 RBCs...damn!), and right as I was finished the mom asked me how many of those I had done, and I told her honestly this was only my 3rd one this year, and her jaw fell...but because i was calm, she never knew, and her child's LP was successful 🙂
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I'm not sure if you understood my point. I don't mind someone watching me do the procedure. The scenario I'd like to avoid is having a parent pass out because they were unprepared for the nature of the procedure itself, in which case I'd have two patients to worry about instead of one. Most residents and attendings at my institution do not allow parents to watch procedures for this very reason.
 
LeftVentricle said:
I'm not sure if you understood my point. I don't mind someone watching me do the procedure. The scenario I'd like to avoid is having a parent pass out because they were unprepared for the nature of the procedure itself, in which case I'd have two patients to worry about instead of one. Most residents and attendings at my institution do not allow parents to watch procedures for this very reason.
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Interesting, sounds like a lot of this is institution dependent. At my institution, I (like the majority of my colleagues) almost always invite parents to stay in the room during LPs/I&D/lac repairs and similar procedures. I do ask them to sit down for most procedures. In my experience, about 25% choose to leave and about 75% stay. For sedated fracture reductions, we ask parents to leave (for many reasons---the room is already crowded, we're using fluoro/xrays and don't have enough lead to go around, even when adequately sedated with ketamine kids still sometimes move around and this can freak parents out, fracture reductions are pretty brutal to watch sometimes, etc). I know our heme/onc docs/NPs also ask parents to leave during bone marrows, for the same reasons.
 
Psuedoseizures, anyone? 'Nuff said.
 
doctawife said:
Psuedoseizures, anyone? 'Nuff said.
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we have a neurologist at my hospital who says he loves working with patients with pseudoseizures....can you imagine??? no thanks...
 
LeftVentricle said:
2. Being "hit on" by a patient's (single) mother.

. . .
His mother, meanwhile, could not take her eyes off of me. Initially, I had thought that she was the type of person who always asked a lot of questions, but as time passed, her questions became more and more personal. Though it's possible she was simply trying to be nice, her behavior seemed too friendly. She was talking to me as though I were an old friend she hadn't seen in a while, as opposed to a fourth-year medical student.

...
In retrospect, the question begs asking: do these single mothers not realize that we're on to them? One of my classmates had a similar experience, and it seems clear that single mothers seem to view aspiring male pediatricians as a potential "gold-mine," as my friend as eloquently put it. 🙂

Thoughts?
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I blame Grey's Anatomy. Heck, did anyone see 30 Rock the last 2 weeks? Tina Fey found a great guy - he's a pediatrician.

As wierd as this is, it's even wierder when you're pretty sure that 17 year old CF patient flirts with you during morning pre-rounds . . . . every morning.
 
KidDr said:
we have a neurologist at my hospital who says he loves working with patients with pseudoseizures....can you imagine??? no thanks...
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One of our neurologists loves it because he gets to be an ass (or so he says). He takes a vial of normal saline and tells them that 'In people who have seizures this medicine makes them have a seizure." He injects the saline sub q, they fake their seizure. He then takes a separate syringe of NS and says "this medicine is the the antidote to the first and will stop a seizure." Magically they stop when it's injected. Then he tells them it's all fake. LOVE it.

I had a kid on the wards who was faking. 13 year old boy, and a real punk. I walked in and loudly told the nurse "Hey Jen, get the rectal tube, the biggest one we have. He's seizing so bad the only medicine that will work is the stuff we have to put up his bum with a large tube." He stopped in midseizure with a ghastly look on his face and didn't 'seize' again during that stay. :laugh:
 
BigNavyPedsGuy said:
As wierd as this is, it's even wierder when you're pretty sure that 17 year old CF patient flirts with you during morning pre-rounds . . . . every morning.
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In this case, I almost wonder if the CF patient feels more comfortable around doctors and hospitals than she does any other setting, given that so many children with medical problems are socially ostracized at school or other settings that feature people their own age.

That said, I agree that your situation is extremely weird. 😎
 
Seeing a 4 yo anxious patient with 2 days history of fever, cough, runny nose.. and not the most cooperative of kids.

Mother: "Listen to the doctor or he'll give you a shot."

Me {Thinking}: You are not helping. 👎
 
I had my first patient literally run screaming out of the office yesterday (he stopped just outside the door because he's not allowed to cross the street). He has a huge phobia of strep tests, as it turns out. Half an hour later we and his mom cajoled him into getting it. Of course it was negative.
 
bjackrian said:
I had my first patient literally run screaming out of the office yesterday (he stopped just outside the door because he's not allowed to cross the street). He has a huge phobia of strep tests, as it turns out. Half an hour later we and his mom cajoled him into getting it. Of course it was negative.
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That's a very odd phobia.
 
Bernardo_11 said:
Seeing a 4 yo anxious patient with 2 days history of fever, cough, runny nose.. and not the most cooperative of kids.

Mother: "Listen to the doctor or he'll give you a shot."

Me {Thinking}: You are not helping. 👎
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Oh my, I used to get so annoyed at these moms. Then I learned to fight back. I just flat out disagree with the mom in front of the kid. 😛
 
doctawife said:
Psuedoseizures, anyone? 'Nuff said.
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Chest pain. Seriously, chest pain is killing me right now. And no, not my own, but I may start to get some with the next adolescent with it (just got off the phone with an ER about another one).

umass rower said:
That's a very odd phobia.
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Not really. A proper swab should get both tonsils and the posterior oropharynx. Even with a normal gag reflex, that just doesn't feel good. Needles don't make you wretch (at least most people).
 
This thread needs to be resurrected. Especially since many of us posters were in training when it started and are attending now.

I finished my Navy time and I'm a Gen Pediatrician at a rural community hospital. I have to say the absolute worst part of my job is the after-hours calls. Any parent can call me anytime to ask any stupid question. Last night one called, woke me up (via the operator).
Dad: you saw my baby today
Sleepy me: Yes....
Dad: you said his motrin dose was 3ml
Me: OK....
Dad: well the bottle says to give 1.25
Me: if that's the dose I gave when you're child was in front of me and I was staring at their weight on a piece of paper, then it was right
Dad:....
 
I'll throw in another vote for seeing kids you know are f***ed. The teenager or younger with a mom with fibromyalgia or opiate addicted parents who come bring their home-schooled kid in for some nebulous pain or other psychosomatic complaint. Oh and they have toxic mold exposure. And an asinine list of allergies. And 5 specialists to work-up their endless nausea, belly pain, headaches, tingling, etc. All you can hope is they hit college and see some normal people and realize how bat-s**t crazy their parents are.

That and the anti-vaccination crowd.
 
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