Monday, July 26, 2010

I Am Not Always Nice


I relieved a CRNA for his lunch break. He gave me a very good report on the patient before leaving the room. A few seconds after his departure I looked over the drape to check on the surgeons' progress, because I noticed one of the drugs we were using at regular intervals was starting to wear off.

(Surgeon #1 is generally well-liked among the nurses, anesthetists, and anesthesiologists for his competence and humor.

Surgeon #2 is almost unanimously disliked for his arrogance, rudeness, and inferior skill in comparison with Surgeon #1.)

Me: "How much longer do you think you might be?"

Surgeon #2 (muttering): "Why are these people always chomping at the bit?"

Me: "Why do you assume that I'm asking because I'm 'chomping at the bit?' "

Surgeon #2: "Well, that other guy asked the same thing a while ago."

Me: "Has it not occurred to you, after all your years of experience, that questions about the duration of surgery have nothing to do with being in a hurry to finish surgery but rather have everything to do with planning and executing a safe anesthetic for your patient, and making sure the TIMING of the drugs we give coordinates with what you're doing? Some of us actually try to put some THOUGHT into our moment-to-moment management of patients. When we ask you how long you have, it's almost always for the sake of pharmacologic timing, so we can be sure to provide the drugs you NEED for the procedure to go on, not because we give a flying fig how long you're going to take."

Silence.

Surgeon #1: "About twenty more minutes."

Me: "THANK you."

Don't mess with me.

13 comments:

Borborismocerebral said...

It is the same everywhere, I simpatize with every word you said.

KT said...

You are awesome! Love it!

Anonymous said...

Good job, Anesthesioboist! Surgeons can be such hemorrhoidal infrastructures sometimes!

Jo said...

*Applause*

rlbates said...

Yes, the timing can be tricky. :)

mw said...

My husband's had 4 surgeries in the last 5 weeks in Boston, and I hope his anaesthesiologists and anaesthetists would do exactly the same thing if necessary. Thank you.

anesthesiaman said...

seizing the teachable moment...kodus

OMDG said...

MEOW.

Just kiddding. Surgeon 2 sounds like he's a PIA.

Anonymous said...

Well said! My dh is an anesthesiologist, and he used to get this attitude all the time as a resident. He basically said the same thing you said.

He also loved it when a certain surgeon would say he was in charge of anesthesia (which a monkey could do) and dh must do what he said to do. So one day dh said, "Great! I guess you don't need me, so I'll go and leave the anesthesia to you!" Never heard those comments again, and the attendings totally backed dh up when the surgeon complained!

Lisa Johnson said...

Wow! Nicely done! ; )

Varsha said...

ah surgeons and their egos.....

Anonymous said...

Not all surgeons are hemorrhoidal infrastuctures- Anesthesioboist has known a few of us over the years who have been pretty ok~ especially those of us who enjoy a good chocolate and can discuss Star Trek The Next Generation intelligently.

T. said...

So true, so true - and those surgeons are THE BEST! :)

(Nice to hear from you, Anon - hope all is well!)