Tag: patients

Self Promotion

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The Things They Tell Ya

Boy oh boy. The things they tell ya as a patient. “You just concentrate on getting better.” “Don’t worry. We’ll take care of everything. It will all be ok.” Oh lord nowhere! Stop yourself before ever saying those words! These well-meaning phrases are truly sentimental BS at best. As good as they sound, nothing could really be further from the truth. If only it were that simple! When you are sick, there are many many things to consider besides just getting better. Do doctors hope that by saying that out loud that all other concerns will melt away? Do they think that all of your loved ones and coworkers will magically hear it and step up even more? Do they think that banks will easily forgive leases and loans that you can’t pay?

For me, I am still worried about taking care of my family. I am very fortunate with my home situation, but I worry about who is going to cook when I can’t or how school is going when I don’t have the energy to keep track. I worry about letting my patients down. I worry about my business surviving. I worry at every schedule change and how it inconveniences everybody. I worry about the medical bills. They have already topped 50,000 just in the first two months of this year.

The already potentially daunting task of fighting cancer would still be daunting if the only thing you had to worry about was getting better. It is ten times more so when you add in all the real life factors to the scenario. Here is my turn to wax hypocritical for a minute. Now that I have just completed my complaint streak and pronounced that advice as bogus, I am still not entirely sure that I want doctors to stop sayin it. By far the biggest part of me still thinks it’s a ridiculous statement that is very well-meaning but entirely unhelpful. And yet, sometimes when I hear it, I enjoy my momentary mental trip to fantasy land…wondering what it would be like if it were true. I guess what I am really saying is, at this point, I can appreciate the intention of saying it and we will just leave the factual aspect out of it…lol

Dr. Laura

Man! It’s lonely being a patient right now!

Yet another reason to hate what changes Covid has brought to the world. It seems like no aspect of our lives has gone unchanged or untouched. A lot of it has been inconvenience like not being able to go to concerts and having to wear masks everywhere, which a lot of us complain about, but yet our lives have still gone on. Other restrictions have been down right tragic like not being able to see loved ones for gatherings, accompany them to the doctor or even visit them in the hospital when they are sick. Even with some of the restrictions lifted or modified, it is a lonely lonely time to be a patient right now.

It is study proven that family support increases the likelihood of successful treatment and recovery, whether that be from surgery, addiction, or cancer. So, what have we done? We have completely eliminated that extra advantage with the Covid restrictions. I feel like we have failed patients because we didn’t even consider other options. Patients have had to go alone to complicated doctor appointments. We all know that it is always better to have more than one set of ears to listen, especially when it comes to complicated diagnoses and instructions. Patients have had to go through chemo treatments alone with no one to pass the time with. Sometimes those sessions last for 8 hours. For a while, patients were languishing in the hospital with no visitors, unless their case became terminal, at which point all communication opportunities and precious time were already gone and families experienced twice the loss: the loss of the loved one and the loss of the time they could have shared. When I was in the hospital in January, there were patients that had been on the oncology floor for almost a month with no visitors, fighting for their lives with no family support.

Back to reality. Of course, I understand the concern for spread of the virus and the potential consequences. But now we have rapid tests for covid. We could test visitors and assess for positivity in a potentially expedient manner. I know what you are going to say. The tests could be false negative. Yes that is true. Nothing is 100% fool proof and there could be risks. I understand how serious it is. However, my educated crystal ball says that we are going to look back on this time period and notice that recovery rates for all hospital-based illness went down by at least 25%. At this point, I am just not sure that the tradeoff has been worth it. None of those lonely patients will ever get that time back.

Dr. Katz

The Art of Slogging

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OK, now that I have your attention. What the hell is slogging? The word slog is a verb meaning to work hard over a period of time. It also means to hit forcefully and typically wildly, especially in boxing. For the purposes of this blog, we are going to stick with the first definition. Personally, I also find the word imbued with a trace of difficulty or struggle as well, as if the work being done is innately more challenging than usual and that more effort is required. I also think that it implies a certain lack of joy in the task to be completed. Even the word itself has a heaviness to it, at least mentally and emotionally. I don’t find myself using it unless I am referring to a state in which I am struggling to get the basic requirements completed day to day. One final potentially positive component of the word slog is the implication of a necessary process, like slogging to get somewhere.

I think that this word perfectly describes the world at large today with all of the changes in restrictions, work environments, and day to day life. The level of unpredictability and the lack of control has brought out the worst in some and brought out the best and most altruistic in others. I even find myself struggling to get up, get dressed, and get psyched up to face the day, not knowing if I am going to be at the hospital for 25 hours or 4 hours, or if anyone is even going to show up. It is a conscious, sometimes burdensome mental effort to go to work and strive each day. This is by no means a reflection of how much I love my job. I LOVE MY JOB. I always will. I LOVE MY PATIENTS. I am grateful to even have a job. I have always embraced the role of the uplifting, caring, compassionate superhero to women. It’s my favorite thing in the whole world to help save someones life, make it better or bring new life into the world. It’s just that the positive level of variety that first attracted me is not the same. The variety I now encounter has more to do wondering who if anyone is going to show up on a given day. On top of that, my hands are tied with regard to what services I am ALLOWED to provide for patients. Some of the best aspects of my job in terms of preventative care and early diagnosis are severely limited right now because I do not have a crystal ball to predict what a patient needs without a procedure, exam or surgery. It is very frustrating to go to work every day knowing that I am not able to give patients everything they need. I worry every day about what I am potentially missing because of these limitations. Last, but not least, let’s not forget the mental burden of economic insecurity. There is no unemployment for bosses and business owners. There are some loans with a mountain of paperwork and extensive stipulations, but even those have no guarantee of ensuring the survival of your business of 20+ years. There you go, slogging at it’s best. I am getting through every day and working hard, but it is a struggle and the joy factor is more limited, not because I don’t love what I do, but because I am not allowed to completely do what I do. And yet, I keep slogging away in order to be able to eventually get back to running my practice as I see fit.

I get the same kind of feeling at home too. Most days, I manage to get myself motivated to at least attempt a project that has been hanging over my head( sometimes for years) and then other times I feel like I would rather scream than clean one more thing and I just don’t feel like doing anything. The difficulty rating of just going to the store has now been elevated to a ten out of ten between masking, gloving, making lists and figuring out a strategy to get the most with the least trips, knowing that I might not leave the house for an errand for another few weeks at best. Then there is the daily feeling hanging over your head that leaves you wondering if this truly is the new normal? On top of that is the constant barrage of input from all directions of conspiracy and control theories that only serve to add to the overall panic and disrupt any logical progression of thought. You cannot get away from them. You turn off the news and they appear on you social media instead. You turn away from social media and just listening to music and your broadcast is interrupted with another update. Whew! It’s a bit much. Again, slogging at it’s best. But, right now, there is no other choice. I have to keep slogging through on my way back to the way things used to be. It’s part of the process right now. It’s part of the process of doing my part in order to flatten the pandemic curve. If I quit or rebel, I am not making anything go any faster. Maybe if we all slog together, we may just get to the end of this thing a little faster. Let me leave you with this quote from Walter Annenberg, philanthropist, businessman, and ambassador:

” I want to remind you that success in life is based on hard slogging. There will be periods when discouragement is great and upsetting, and the antidote for this is calmness and fortitude and a modest yet firm belief in your competence. Be sure that your priorities are in order so that you can proceed in a logical manner, and be ever mindful that nothing will take the place of persistence.”

Dr. Katz