The Old Coot wants the
truth.
By Merlin Lessler
The big lie, “I’ll be
right with you.” You get this when you’ve been in line for a while and finally
it’s your turn. You step to the counter and hear, “I’ll be right with,” as the
clerk runs to the storage room or answers their cell phone, or heaven forbid, closes
the counter and goes on break.
That’s bad, but the
medical version is worse. You go to the check in desk, hand over your insurance
cards, your driver’s license, state your birth date, answer a list of questions
and find a seat after being told, “The doctor will be right with you.”
Sometimes the doctor is, but more likely, you face an indeterminate wait: 5
minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes; time crawls by, because you don’t know how
long it will be. And that’s just the first round. Next, you’re taken to the
“little” room and get a second, “The doctor will be right with you.” No, they
won’t! You get to gaze at anatomy charts and pictures of horrible repercussions
of the malady you came to have checked out. It’s a grim wait. The minute hand
on your watch barely moves. Each tick takes forever; you tap your watch to see
if it’s working. Ten minutes becomes a lifetime, longer than the time between
Thanksgiving and Christmas when you were a five-year-old kid.
It doesn’t have to be this
way. We don’t mind waiting for doctors if it’s because they are taking time
with another patient to provide thorough and quality medical care. It’s not
knowing how long the wait will be that causes the angst. It would be so much easier
if you were told it will be 10 minutes; it will be 20 minutes, or whatever.
And, then updated when that promised time has elapsed. The information is at
hand; the person who told you the doctor will be right with you knows. It just
isn’t dispersed and is the reason so many people are on blood pressure
medicine. The profession calls it the white coat syndrome. But, it really is
the undefined wait time that causes your pressure to go up!
The next time I’m told
that the doctor will be right with me, I’m not going to let it go unchallenged.
“How long will I have to wait? And, what’s your name and birth date so I can
follow up with you if you lied?” Let their blood pressure go up for a
change.
Comments, complaints. Send
to – mlessler7@gmail.com
No comments:
Post a Comment