Tuesday, May 19, 2009

5/20 - no biopsy today


Funny thing about the medical industry . . . As a lawyer (and someone who runs an office), I hear a lot (especially from doctors) about how bad lawyers (and insurance companies) are, and how the medical profession suffers as a result. One converse of that is the comparison between the two industries. As a lawyer, customer service is paramount. We do what the client needs, when the client needs it. No excuses. Ever. No "we don't have the manpower". No "sorry, budget cuts have left us shortstaffed". On a daily basis, the customer experience in the hospital is a series of incidents where they don't care about the "customer", because they have "triage" issues. In other words, they are too busy. In my world, we plan for these things. If one group is too busy, we reallocate personnel. If somebody is an "add-on" because they have an emergency, we definitely don't play martyr and we don't act as if we are doing them a favor by servicing them. If two lawyers need to communicate, they speak to each other. If lawyers interview a client, they would read those notes again rather than having different staff members ask the client the same background questions over and over and over again (I'm looking at you, anesthesia department).


After starving the little guy until 3:30p.m. in the afternoon, they decided that they couldn't do the necessary biopsy today because "they couldn't get an anesthesiologist." I can't imaging ever telling a client "sorry about your kid, but my secretary/paralegal/associate is busy on other things." I certainly wouldn't tell a client that when the client's dad (me) was riding in my elevator two minutes earlier looking at the off-duty anesthesiologists. (It's hard to hide when your name and department is written on your jacket).


He's happy, because he's eating now and because I went and picked up the new Yu Gi Oh game on the first day or release.


P.S. - The anestheseologist (who seems very nice) just showed up to give us the pregame for an impending biopsy. 20 minutes after telling us that Jake can eat, the surgery department sent up the anestheseologist to prepare for the "immediate" surgery. Too late. AARGH!



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