I've been in sort of a torpor lately, born of moving, unpacking, painting, fixing and repairing, all amidst horribly crappy weather. Then I saw this item in today's Chicago Tribune:
That's a big "well, duh!" Part of my real job as a health care strategist involves cajoling hospitals to give a damn about patients and their opinions and attitudes. Hospitals say they care. They're frequently, depressingly wrong. As a patient, you might hope they care. You're likely to be disappointed, too. Paraphrasing a former GE CEO's comments about bureaucracies everywhere, "...it's not that (hospitals, doctors and nurses) dislike (patients) - they don't. It's just that they don't find patients nearly as interesting as they do themselves."
Presto! Torpor gone. I'm back to storming the ramparts - Kevlar jockstrap firmly in place -lest the status quo-clingers and "why?-askers" win. I'm a "why not?-asking" kinda guy myself.
Out for a run while it's 67 degrees; it's supposed to be 38 tomorrow, with snow flurries. WTF?
UPDATED DAY AFTER REFLECTIONS: Perhaps I shouldn't have included nurses in the "disliking patients" troika. Hmmm.
Word of the day: TORPOR; a state of mental and motor inactivity with partial or total insensibility; a state of lowered physiological activity typically characterized by reduced metabolism, heart rate, respiration, and body temperature that occurs in varying degrees especially in hibernating and estivating animals.
iPod Shuffle: "Take the "A" Train" by Duke Ellington.
1 comment:
VM- As a nurse, who worked one of the top hospitals in the Midwest. I could believe that hospital CEO's,VP's and the like including physician's are more interested in themselves than the patients. Never the NURSES,we are the backbone of the hospital along with the ancillary staff. We carry out the doctors orders. We comfort the patient's. Whether it be ,the woman who is going for a breast biopsy with possible mastectomy and doesn't know if she'll have a breast when she wakes up. OR The family who just lost a loved one after a long illness. OR Calling the doctor back for the 3rd time because the patient hasn't gotten any relief from pain meds. prescribed. OR Cleaning up after a pt. after he felt like he could handle the steak and potatoes for dinner. Post a 2 hr.surgery even though, you tried to tell him to take it slow. Start with jello,first. Do we say ."I told you so-NO! We politely bite our tongue. Give a shot of antiemetic,few ice chips, and maybe jello -later. And go on to the next crisis. I say the GE CEO, has never met a NURSE. Sharon
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