I was in a hospital recently. I was looked at by an intern....
I asked to see a real doctor but he was out administering to someone else who was dying. Was this legal?
The intern was trying to perform a spinal tap on me to check for spinal meningitis but he couldn't find the right spot. He tried 5 different times, each time missing. This caused me a sensational amount of pain.
I was told that the doctor over him was with another person outside the hospital who was dying. Was this legit? Isn't the supervising doctor supposed to be on call whenever needed? I am also told that supervising physicians do this all the time. It was late at night, around 3am.
When the supervising physician did arrive, around 6am he found the right spot and the spinal tap proceeded.
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ANSWERS: 4
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I'm usually seen by a nurse practitioner who confers with the doctor who is in another room on location
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Linda Joy I'm sorry that happened to you. I know how you feel. They tried to give me a spinal tap once and they crunched in my spine 4 or 5 times as well, he said he got a "bleed" Practically accused me of withholding information and I was in tears because my neck hurt really bad and they made me roll into a ball. I also felt radiating pain going out from my spine one time when they stuck me. It was a long time ago. -
Beat Covid, Avoid Republicans wow, I'm sorry to hear that. I feel for you. There is a certain spot and if they hit it they don't hurt. Anywhere else - Its the worst pain you've ever had in your life. When the real doctor showed up, he gave me 10cc of lorazepam to quiet my nerves after the trauma. He said it was enough to put an elephant to sleep. It didn't put me to sleep. I had breakfast instead. lol
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Yes. Especially in the "Emergency Room", interns do anything within their competence. There is a doctor who is supposed to be readily available in cases that are beyond the ability of the intern (a sort of supervising physician), but the interns do most of the work there. *** Apart from the emergency room, interns still do a lot of the work - again: especially anything within their competence. That is: basic stuff that the "real doctor" doesn't want to bother with if he or she doesn't want to do so. *** Remember: interns have already graduated medical school. They're already MDs. Interning is how they get enough real-world experience to get certified in various specialties.
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An intern isn't going to do anything he's not qualified to do. Besides learning how to prescribe medications to hide symptoms, another area they must be experienced is inconveniencing the patient.
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Beat Covid, Avoid Republicans
Actually the intern who tried to do the spinal tap on me didn't know how to find the right place.. That was my experience. -
Army Veteran
I don't think "not knowing the right place" would necessarily apply. If he looked behind the knees, then you might have a case. But just exploring doesn't say much. When I get blood drawn, they have to take core samples to find the vein that is producing. -
www.bible-reviews.com
I have to agree with Hulk...the intern doesn't always know what they are doing, and when they are in a situation in which it's "I'm the only one here to do it", they WILL try IF they don't think the patient is in any danger. There's been many a horror story of interns making serious mistakes. I remember one I read about (true story from a reputable source): the intern was using a "hot knife" to perform a circumcision on an infant. The poor little guy's dingaling "melted" completely away. (And yes: you can tell by my lingo that I'M not a medical professional.) Simple case of an intern not having sufficient experience caused a patient - a perfectly healthy patient, as far as that particular part of the body was concerned - to suffer a lifetime of debility. -
Army Veteran
You're going to have to provide a link to your "reputable source". Reputable sources are only as credible as one wants to believe. Unless it's documented somewhere, "reputable sources" are no more trustworthy than Hulk's fake news sources. -
Beat Covid, Avoid Republicans
Well considering 1465's the same one who thinks that the last election was stolen from Trump, and that Alex Jones was telling the truth about Sandy Hook, and that 6 million Jews did NOT die in the Holocaust - his opinion doesn't count for very much. -
Beat Covid, Avoid Republicans
And yes, I had an intern poke me 4 times and couldn't find the proper place to draw spinal fluid from. -
www.bible-reviews.com
Army: no, I don't have to do that...and besides, it was an article in a medical-oriented news journal that I read when I worked at a hospital....in the 1980s. Sure, you can doubt the authenticity of my recounting of the story. No skin off my nose. But it DID happen, and other stuff like that DOES happen. -
Army Veteran
Something like that would have hit the news media somewhere. I couldn't find anything on it. -
www.bible-reviews.com
It DID hit the news media. That's where I read it. It hit the news media about 40 years ago. Did you check the news media from 40 years ago?
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So, if doctor is supposed to be "on call whenever needed" and he was already with another individual who also expected the same courtesy, how would doctor manage to be in 2 places at once. One of my son's in law is a doctor and his services are required at multiple hospitals in the San Joaquin valley. He puts in long hours going from hospital to hospital to see his patients. They do all they can, in my experience. Did you ever get the spinal tap done?
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