IT’S NOT COOL BEING DR. MOM… It’s 3AM…..”Oh no! What was that sound I heard?”, I thought to myself as I suddenly awoke to a startling noise coming from the adjacent bedroom to mine. “Could it be coming from my daughter’s room?”, I wondered.
My husband and I quickly went to our daughters’ room and there she was, our 15-year-old daughter, curled up in a fetal position on her bed writhing in pain and groaning softly. “What’s wrong?!”, we both seemed to say at once. “I don’t know, but my tummy hurts really bad”, she said in a whisper. I asked if she ate or drank anything she was not used to eating and she said no. She also denied having any nausea, vomiting, or loose bowel movements. I rushed to the kitchen to get her some ginger ale as her groaning intensified. Being a Family Nurse Practitioner, I realized that my instinct to “protect and cure” was gradually kicking in and probably reached an overdrive as I thought of all the worst case clinical scenarios that initially present as abdominal pain. “Could this be an inflamed appendix (appendicitis)…?, a hernia…?, a twisted intestine…?, an obstruction…..?”, I thought to myself as I returned to her room with a glass of ginger ale. She took a few sips and before I had the chance to ask how she felt, she literally started screaming that her pain had worsened after which she threw up all over her bed. “OK, we are going to the Emergency room!”, I half screamed at my husband who then assisted her to get dressed as I also quickly got dressed and helped her into the car. It was close to 3:30 AM by this time. I sped to the nearest Emergency Department, and by the time we arrived, I was so anxious that I was barely concentrating as I responded to the staff at the registration center who verified our insurance coverage plan. “When will we see the doctor?”, I asked the lady by the desk. She assured me that my daughter would be seen shortly. When my daughter was called in to the examination section, I assisted her as she slowly walked to the exam room. She lay on the bed as the nurse walked into the room and with a friendly smile, she looked at my daughter and said, “So, what seems to be the problem today?”. Before my daughter could respond, I hurriedly said, “her tummy hurts really bad, she threw up once and I don’t know ….it may be her appendix…. when will the doctor come in because she’s really in a lot of pain.….maybe you should give her some pain medicine or do you think she needs an X-ray first…?” The nurse stared at me with a blank expression as I turned to my daughter, who appeared a bit more comfortable as she lay on the exam table. I observed my daughter’s horrified facial expression as she quietly mouthed the words “mom please, stop!”. “Oh my, I have turned into a Dr. Mom! I must stop and focus on reducing my anxieties in other ways,”
I thought to myself. Chapter 11 of my recently published book, “Simple Tips To Developing A Productive Clinician-Patient Relationship” gives in more details the characteristics of a “Dr. Mom or Dr. Dad”. As a clinician and author of a self-help book in the Body-Mind-Spirit-category, I always believed that I had a decent level of self-control over my emotions. Being a mother of 4 girls, I can truly relate to an overly zealous parent’s attitude that may sometimes be misinterpreted by the clinician as being somewhat intrusive. However, I never imagined that I would display the characteristics of some of the patients that I highlighted in my book. In this book, I narrated 16 various patient characteristics/attitudes and the impact of each attitude on building a productive clinician-patient relationship. As a current or future clinician, you may wonder how you can connect with your patients despite the various patient attitudes (pleasant and unpleasant) during a consultation. How do you respond to such patients as the “Angry patient”, the “Suspicious patient”, the “Opinionated patient”, the “Talkative patient” etc. and still maintain a positive pattern of interaction? This is the perfect book for you to learn the simple tips for effective clinician-patient communication for efficient healthcare management. Humorous cartoon dialogues make it a reader friendly book and quite easy to relate to. Well, getting back to the scenario of my daughter’s Emergency Room visit, I said a silent prayer that the nurse would not hastily become defensive to my approach of history giving and that she would still show compassionate care. Obviously, I very quickly came to my senses when my daughter mouthed the words, “mom, please, stop!” and I apologized for my overly enthusiastic approach while letting the nurse know that being a mom and a Family Nurse Practitioner probably contributed to my heightened state of anxiety. She smiled and said that she’s also a mom and could relate to how I felt. Further assessment proceeded without any undue interruptions and X-Ray report revealed that my daughter was severely constipated. She fully recovered following the administration of 2 enemas.
I sure learned a valuable lesson on that day: Underlying anxieties can manifest as different attitudes and personalities and as clinicians, we have the responsibility to recognize patients’ behavioral traits/attitudes and communicate effectively to reduce patient’s anxieties and develop more productive clinician-PATIENT and clinician-PARENT relationships. It is vital to have the patience and empathy that are vital to providing compassionate care to all individuals regardless of their attitudes and values.
We must strive to let others see positive characteristics in all we do and to experience the values Christ would like us all to share. Simple Tips to Developing A Productive Clinician-Patient Relationship is available on the author’s website (www.ptdrsimpletips.com) AND on amazon website www.amazon.com/-/e/B01MS36RZK
Just a Nurse is a place where nurses can share their lived experiences of the profession. This is a collection of real stories from nurses and student nurses, in various disciplines.
Love this article ! Thank you