Posts by Jacob Fox6

Hey everyone, just hanging out and feeling the good vibes today... hope you're all having an absolute blast... says:
Jacob Fox6

Looks like we finally ended up on the same page after all...
It honestly just feels so much better when you can actually see a doctor who isn't totally stressed out... someone who won't snap at you for no reason...
Plus, once they realize you're part of the inner circle, their whole vibe changes and they start treating you way differently...
And you'll end up asking way more questions too, since most "regular" patients don't even realize what they didn't understand until they finally get back home...
Of course working in hospitals is way tougher, especially since you're dealing with such a wild mix of patient personalities every single day, so every doctor, nurse, and staff member just has to find their own little way to process all that chaos so they can actually make it home feeling like a sane human being...😢
I’m telling you again, everything just goes a whole lot smoother when you lead with a little bit of kindness...👍

Hope you have a killer day at work... 🙂

thanks... 🙂 Same here... 🙂

I totally get that... It’s wild how their whole vibe shifts the second they realize you might be joining them on the team, and honestly, it makes you wonder why they even bother acting that way... That one doctor I was talking about is just a nightmare to deal with, not just for me but for everyone who walks through those clinic doors... I’m not trying to make this all about my own grudge, but I genuinely don't have a single good thing to say about her... I’m not asking for some sunshine-and-rainbows level of kindness, just basic human decency where she doesn't treat me like I'm an inconvenience for breathing... She's a terrible physician, and knowing her for years, I really doubt I'd be overstepping if I said she's a pretty lousy person too...

Casey Palmer5 said:Every single time I take my pets to the vet, I walk away just blown away by them. Seriously, if you're working with animal patients, you really ought to take a page out of their book...

😁

You totally missed the most obvious point here... animals can't talk, so vets don't really have anyone to lose their cool with after fifteen years on the job... 😁

Angela Wright said:Sorry, but you're wrong. I used to hold that exact same view until I actually started digging into the subject, specifically regarding malignant diseases.
I honestly believe the ego trip among doctors is massive. We have people being sent from Miami to New York City with botched sarcomas or completely incorrect diagnoses because specialists aren't communicating with one another. They know perfectly well that at Mayo Clinic, there are only two or three specialists who actually handle those types of tumors. But once things get complicated, they ship them off... and by then, naturally, any shred of hope has been stripped away.
But I am going to say it for the hundredth time: the real problem is how nothing is communicated to the parents. Instead of getting clear, actionable data, they get stress shoved in their faces far too late to even look for other options. There is a world of difference between the two approaches.

Well, honestly, you totally took what I said out of context since you only just decided to add that extra explanation now...

I mean, what do I even know about all that technical incompetence? I honestly can't say much since I'm not dealing with any of that myself and I really don't want to just sit here theorizing about it... 🤷I just know that I’m out here giving it my all, trying to learn the ropes and do everything by the book, but as for the rest of it... I honestly don't know... the only people I could really weigh in on are my classmates from college, because when it comes to actual doctors, I just don't have a clue... 🤷

swiftbear86 said:Angela Wright

Hey, don't get all worked up right now..
It's probably time to just call it a night..

You can't really expect doctors—people who spend their entire shift staring down the same grim realities, dealing with life-or-death situations and heavy illnesses—to listen to an argument that every single patient is just being "overly sensitive" or "too subjective."
Especially when those patients are just looking for straight answers..
The truth is, some people just don't have that empathetic spark, some choose to keep an emotional distance just to survive the job, and others are simply burnt out..

Plus, you'll always run into those high-maintenance patients who feel like nothing is ever quite right or good enough..👎

My point was simply this: everyone feels a lot better when things are communicated with a little bit of humanity, rather than coming off as arrogant...(and I'm definitely not questioning anyone's expertise here)🙂

I'm pretty much on board with most of that...

swiftbear86 said:Look, if the patient is acting like an animal, we don't necessarily have to act like one too...👎
When I was younger, I used to think you always had to assert yourself as the big authority figure in the room...
And sure, I managed to pull that off, but I eventually realized my job is just way easier when I choose to be kind...
When you stay approachable, patients don't feel the need to act out their primal instincts against you...😍
At the end of the day, we all have our own philosophies on how to make our careers more manageable...
Being kind isn't about how much you know; it’s about who you are as a person.👍

I'm totally on board with that. Honestly, this is like the third time in forty minutes I've felt the need to bring up my take on workplace culture...

God... it feels like it never ends... people keep saying just be nice to everyone five times over... but that wasn't even the point, the point is when they grab you by the arm in the hallway and won't listen to a word you say after explaining it five different ways... the reality is you run into people where no matter how you approach them, there's zero connection... staying friendly works better in private practice because you actually know your patients, but in a big hospital setting, it's a whole different beast since you're seeing strangers constantly... today I had one crazy person walk in, then one normal person, and then immediately two more crazies right behind them, and it just kept going like that until the shift ended... it's enough to drive anyone insane... honestly, the only way to survive mentally is to just become numb to it all! Has it never occurred to people that since most doctors end up that way, it might actually be the only way to endure the job? A doctor is a human being too, but everyone forgets that because when it comes to their own health, people get so selfish that their true colors really start to show. Doctors aren't immune to bad moods, back pain, PMS if they're women, or personal drama... if a doctor said they didn't want to help, people would lose their minds, but if you ask them to find a needle in a haystack, suddenly it's "unbelievable."

Anyone who thinks they know how a doctor should behave should probably go through med school, finish residency, and grind through at least fifteen years of practice before they start lecturing us. This whole trend of criticizing doctors has become absolutely ridiculous—or maybe it's just me, but I always seem to encounter always either doctors who explain everything perfectly and are completely sane, or patients who are just straight-up delusional. Personally, when I see a doctor, I don't care what kind of mood they're in, it doesn't affect me at all. Except for that one doctor I mentioned, and that's only because she greets me and every other patient with such attitude, and hasn't checked blood pressure, lungs, or heart since she graduated... it's just the same thing every time.

Angela Wright said:You know what? I’m going to be incredibly rude just so I can get banned for it.😠

I want you to tell me how you'd feel when one of your own gets sick—and based on the medical data we see every day, there's a massive chance that'll happen, considering one in three Americans will face some form of cancer in their lifetime.
Go ahead, count the people living in your house, then come back and type this again if you actually have that much shamelessness in your soul!😠😠😠
Who exactly are you to decide what constitutes "the truth," where hope begins, and at what point it turns into a lie?!
That kind of arrogance is clearly your specialty, yet when it comes time to actually be bold and demand better working conditions, you suddenly vanish because you're too terrified of getting fired...😳

I honestly don't get where you're coming from because the guy was just laying out a statistical fact and that's just how it is... Your issue seems to be that you're taking this way too personally. He wasn't trying to count heads in the house or anything, he's just aware of the extra risk everyone faces of catching the same thing. So, maybe take a second to really think about what you said... Doctors deal in hope, because if they didn't, they wouldn't even suggest a specific treatment to you, but it's their job to give you the likely outcome, and that outcome is just a statistic pulled from previous cases. People who rely on hope, especially the fake kind, are usually into alternative medicine, whereas mainstream American medicine doesn't play that way. In Western medicine, everything needs a statistic, a foundation, and an explanation backed by actual research—everything is built on evidence-based medicine, and that’s just the reality of it... Whether one specific case ends up fitting into that larger percentage or not, only time will tell...

What you're calling arrogance is actually just the core of modern medicine, and honestly, that’s what we call expertise... if that doesn't sit right with you, then maybe you shouldn't be looking for treatment from the hard sciences at all...

swiftbear86 said:Once you've put in as many years on the job as I have, you'll see my point..🙄
Since you're still a student, like you mentioned, you've got a lot of catching up to do regarding both your profession and how to actually deal with people..😍
And I'm not talking about a doctor just having an off day here; I'm talking about a consistent pattern of how they treat their patients..👍

I'm always the first one to admit that you've gotta go the extra mile with studying...

Being polite and being affectionate aren't even the same thing, and I already made my point about anyone being rude (maybe you missed that part though)...

But since you brought it up—what about the way patients behave?
Some of these people can be straight-up animals, and me being someone who "still has a lot to learn" doesn't really help when things get wild like that...😉

swiftbear86 said:It’s pretty clear your GP isn't the only one seeing this, given how many people felt the need to start this thread...😁

No way😁, because they're way too busy trying to look important in all those medical journals...🙄😁

swiftbear86 said:Now, you might be able to judge how much your colleagues actually know...
But your "average" patient? They can't do that..
Especially not after their very first meeting with a grumpy specialist..
In the beginning, people are always going to trust the person who treats them with respect and empathy, really listens to them, and walks them through the diagnosis and treatment plan clearly..

Look, obviously expertise is the most important thing...
We can all agree on that..
It's just that patients view the whole situation from their own perspective..☕

I mean, this whole thing just doesn't add up at all... judging a doctor's actual medical expertise based on whether they happen to be having a good day or if they're just in a bad mood is totally baseless... like, seriously, that is just straight-up nonsense...🙄🤣☕

Susan Rodriguez4 said:Look, nobody is asking you to give them a PhD-level lecture; they are asking for options. If you have a patient with an open fracture (since we're talking about that), it's your job as the doctor to say: "You can go into surgery; here are the recovery odds, here are the potential issues, and here are the possible complications." If you don't lay out those chances, risks, and complications, then the patient feels like the path you suggested is the *only* path. They expect a cure because they think they had no choice. If they don't get better, they'll come after you with everything they've got.
And the idea that patients wanting to know everything is somehow shameful? Give me a break. When I take my car to a mechanic, I want to know exactly what he did to it, so imagine when it comes to my own body! It is their right to know!!!!!! I will say it a million times if I have to.
Thank God we have the internet and patient advocacy groups nowadays. All you really need to do is point the patient toward where and how they can research the condition they're dealing with. That's really not that hard.

I am 100% with you on this.

People act like it's a crime to ask about chemical compositions or how a drug actually works. I honestly don't know what kind of examples people are bringing up, because even if I sound like I just landed from outer space, every single doctor I know explains things exactly like you just described, and that's exactly how we're taught in med school too...🤷 (well, except for my primary care doctor—but she's retiring this December anyway)

Jason Howard9 said:It isn't about the bacteria. That gesture actually means, "I feel for you; you only have a month left to live." 😁

😁

My bad, I totally misread that. 😁

But honestly... what else is a person supposed to do? 🤷 A little touch on the arm is just a formal way to show some empathy, and honestly, I think it's pretty reasonable and decent, especially since the doctor is basically a stranger to the patient... family is there for everything else. 🤷

Kate Collins67 said:@ Jacob Fox6

Don't let them spin you around—stick to the conclusions you've reached on your own skin, and then maybe you'll actually be a real doctor. Anyone can talk a big game, but when you're finally standing there in the thick of it, the decision is always going to land squarely on your shoulders. Keep your eyes wide open and don't let them screw you over.
Just do the medical side of the job properly; nobody gets sanctioned for being unlikable.

P.S. If you have no clue what you're doing, at least try to be charming.

😁 You're good—but man, that didn't even make me crack a smile. 😁

Thanks for the input and the advice.😉

Up until now, I've tried my best to stay polite while staying laser-focused on actually getting the work done that's expected of me, but honestly... once I've put in enough years and seniority, I truly think I won't give a damn if someone thinks I was unfriendly, which is usually just how patients describe arrogance... as long as I do my job right and meet my own standards, my conscience is clear and I feel good about myself, and I really don't care if one patient gossips about me, because eventually you'll run into one other person who cares more about whether you're a high-quality doctor and if you're actually good at your job rather than worrying about being bubbly, and even if there's only one of those people out of a hundred, I'll be happy.😉

I realized a long time ago that in medicine you can't afford to be subjective or overly sensitive like a little flower... you're gonna have better days and worse days, but as long as you don't lose sight of that ultimate goal, you know, where everything clicks into place and reminds you why you're doing this in the first place!😉 Even though I'm sure sooner or later there will be moments where I ask myself "why am I even doing this?", I'm a natural optimist so I'm sure I'll find a way to push through it...😁

Susan Rodriguez4 said:Unfortunately, everything you wrote is spot on.
As doctors, it isn't our job to play God or act like prophets by judging people based on how they react when they're terrified, panicking, or acting irrational.
Our job is to explain what happened, why it happened, and how we’re going to help using simple language. We can save the Latin terminology for our own professional chats; if we say "broken shinbone" instead of "fractura tibiae," the patient actually understands us, and it's the same thing. If we can't help, we need to explain why and point them toward someone who can.
Any reasonable, relatively normal person will get the information they need if it's explained this way.
But it’s not our place to decide in advance who is capable of understanding and who isn't. And we should never, ever view it as a waste of time just because we had to explain something twice to a patient who didn't catch it the first time.

I'm with you on that. But let's be real, some things are just way easier to explain than others... If someone has a fracture, but it's complicated or open and stuff, it gets so much harder to walk them through why they need surgery, or antibiotics, or why they might have trouble walking later on... Some things are simple, some aren't, but if you can simplify something without losing the actual point, then you definitely should... But try explaining a brain tumor that completely changes someone's personality! From what I've seen so far, the issue isn't usually that doctors don't tell patients what's wrong—honestly, I haven't met a single doctor who hasn't told a patient their diagnosis unless the patient couldn't understand it—it's more that people suddenly want to know every single tiny detail right away. I honestly find it hard to believe anyone expects a doctor to give them a full lecture on their medication... that's just "too much"🙄... And if they get a diagnosis but have no idea what comes next, that's not on the doctor, it's on the healthcare system and how weirdly it splits up responsibilities between specialists and primary care docs, where nobody is allowed to step outside their own lane...

Kate Collins67 said:Look, speaking both as a doctor and occasionally as a patient myself, my bottom line is simple: when I need a diagnosis or a treatment plan, I want it fast. Period. Does it actually matter if the person providing that care is a total jerk or a literal saint? Honestly, not really. That’s why I find myself nodding along with what Jason Howard9 wrote here.

To put it more bluntly—and maybe I should have phrased it this way from the jump—I’d much rather deal with an absolute moron who actually gives me the medicine I need than some saintly soul who leaves me six feet under because they were too busy being "nice" to be effective.

You know what else I've noticed—it seems like those grumpy ones are actually some of the best doctors out there... 😁

And it's probably because they aren't just acting "tough" or stressed without actually throwing their entire mental energy into solving every single one of their patients' problems, even though they totally burn out afterward... I would take a high-strung expert over some guy who just smiles at you all day and acts super sweet while doing absolutely nothing any day of the week, because it feels like some people care way more about looking good than actually being good at their jobs...

And I am totally with you on this...

Jason Howard9 said:When you look at the doctor-patient relationship, I truly believe the most critical factor is receiving an accurate diagnosis and effective treatment. Will my physician offer me a warm smile or a friendly glance? Honestly, when you consider how many patients walked through those clinic doors before me today, and how many will follow in my footsteps... please, let’s be realistic.
And God forbid they actually try to take my hand 🙂

That is exactly it, I am totally on board with that... except for the hand-holding part, because I am constantly washing mine, just like all the other doctors out there...😁

Kate Collins67 said:@ Jacob Fox6

What happened in the hallway was nothing compared to what's coming—it was just a drop in the bucket. Just wait until you're done with your fax machine🙂
Pretty soon you'll be over here on our side, and then we can stand shoulder to shoulder and defend our positions together.👍

🙂

Honestly, I have so much patience for people, especially my older patients, but man, sometimes I just really want to snap back and walk away instead of wasting my breath, because everything honestly feels like such a massive waste of time, especially when they start getting rude, and I just can't stand being treated without respect...😁...

Basically, the human mind has always fascinated me, both from a psychological and psychiatric perspective, so I spent so much time reading every single thing I could get my hands on even before I went to med school, though I never actually wanted to specialize in it, and I definitely don't want to now. You know... I feel like that whole spectrum of what's considered "normal" is way too stretched out. When you take a closer look at people—and it doesn't even take that long once you've been doing this for a while—you realize just how much pathology lives inside every single person. Most of the time, that individual baggage stays within the "normal" range, but when someone starts badgering you in the middle of a hospital hallway with all that baggage, ignoring everything you say just to repeat their own nonsense, well, you start wondering... I'd probably send half of them straight to psych🤷... The only way I've found to survive this job is to just view the patient as a body with pathological changes, because if I actually stopped to consider all their frustrations and the reasons why they turned out the way they did, I am telling you seriously, I would lose it. It would drive me absolutely crazy...

You're dealing with a whole crowd of brand new faces every single day, each one with their own struggles, their own histories, their own stories... it's heavy... you're all alone against all of them—it's truly terrifying...

I agree with pretty much everything you've said so far, except for that part where we were talking about transplants as an example. That actually has nothing to do with healthcare or patients or anything else besides myself and some personal principles I still hold onto. I'd be delusional and just plain foolish to say those things couldn't change one day, but for right now, that's just how it is...🤷...🙂...

Susan Rodriguez4 said:Medicine is just one of many professions where you're constantly dealing with people. Doctors aren't some special exception to that rule. And yes, working with people is the toughest part, especially when they're sick. But being sick doesn't make someone stupid; they're just unwell. Regardless of how rough your day was as a student, believe me, the patient who just found out they have a serious illness is having a much worse day than you are. And they came to you for help.
As for those colleagues who decided to quit the profession, ask them how long it really takes to learn how to translate medical jargon into plain English. In your case, "plain English" should have been: "I don't know," instead of "I'm just a student passing through." To say that, you need a massive amount of confidence and deep knowledge. Once you reach that level, no patient is going to respect you any less for it.

That's exactly what I was trying to say...🤷
I said I had nothing to do with that department and I had no clue where his labs were, and I only said that maybe five times total... 🤷

I totally agree that working with people is never easy. And I get that patients are going through it too the second they walk into a doctor's office. But the kind of patient you described sounds like a perfectly rational person, and honestly, not everyone is like that. Some people are just... well, they're a handful in general, and then they get sick and just spiral into this total panic, which makes everything so much harder. They become completely irrational, you can't explain anything to them or get through to them, and for someone like me who's still young and doesn't have the years of experience the older doctors have, it feels like absolute hell... so when I'm looking at it from my perspective, I'll admit there are plenty of reasonable, chill patients, but man, there are also the ones who drive you absolutely insane—like when they lie right to your face during an intake, or "accidentally" forget to mention they have diabetes even after you've asked them four different ways before you've even seen their charts. That's probably like 40% of the patients I've dealt with during my studies. It feels like there's no such thing as a "typical" patient because every single one is as different as night and day...🤷

Brandon Newman95 said:Look, I’ll just come out and admit it: I haven't stepped foot in a doctor's office in ten years. There, I said it. Let the judgment commence. Honestly, it was my own damn fault. I should have at least gone in once a year for basic blood work, but I skipped it. Now? Now I'm paying the price for that mistake, dealing with some neurotropic virus that basically dragged me through the ringer for a year and a half because I spent all my time bouncing from one specialist to another.
I'm with Angela Wright on this one. A good doctor really needs to be everything at once—partly your GP, partly your therapist, you know? I actually owe a huge thanks to my primary care doc and his nurse for keeping me sane.
And as for joining the European Union? Don't hold your breath. It's never going to happen. 😉

I feel like we'll end up joining the European Union eventually, one way or another... but honestly, it doesn't even change things for doctors right now. Our degrees are recognized all over Europe anyway, so you can head wherever you want regardless of the status, though having that official tie would definitely make life a little smoother... 🙂

Kate Collins67 said:Look, let’s get one thing straight—whether we're talking about my patients or yours, you're already making that distinction between "my people" and "your people," even though everyone should have equal rights to care. If everyone is being treated according to professional medical standards, there shouldn't be any "mine" or "yours." It shouldn't matter at what stage of treatment I encounter a person; I should just be picking up exactly where the previous doctor left off. But honestly? To actually pull that off, you'd need a massive amount of specialized knowledge, much higher quality medical schools, and a level of top-down organization that our current system just isn't providing.

So, you’re out here preaching that "we treat the patient, not just the disease"? That sounds great on a bumper sticker, really, but let me ask you something—are you actually treating healthy people now too? Because if we're following your logic, what exactly am I supposed to be doing? Am I expected to step in and fix my patients' social struggles? Should I be playing social worker or calling up agencies to handle their living situations? Or maybe I should be acting as an unlicensed therapist and calling in a psychologist to deal with their mental health issues? No. Absolutely not. My job is to treat the actual illness within the patient. For everything else—the social stuff, the psychological stuff, all those other layers—there are plenty of other trained professionals who do that job way better than I ever could, and frankly, I have zero intention of stepping out of my lane and getting tangled up in it.

Look, there are tons of patients out there who have been given incredibly clear, thorough explanations about exactly what’s wrong with them and precisely what steps they need to take to actually get better. But here's the kicker—most of them don't follow a single word of it. It makes you wonder, doesn't it? If we're being honest and looking at the big picture, why are we even wasting our breath? Why spend all this energy on these exhaustive, deep-dive explanations when they just fall on deaf ears? It feels like a total waste of time to go through the whole "educational" process if people aren't going to actually do the work.
It really just depends on the situation—who I’m even talking to, honestly. Some people just aren't worth the breath, you know? So, I guess it comes down to who I’ll actually bother trying to explain things to and, more importantly, who I won't.

Spot on—that is exactly it, period. 🙏

It’s like patients expect their doctors to be full-on psychotherapists. I had a situation just today where someone in the hospital kept asking me for test results, even though I told him at least four times that I was just a student passing through that unit... and the guy just wouldn't listen or process what I was saying. It was such an exhausting day already, and then having to deal with someone who literally can't communicate or understand a simple sentence was just the icing on the cake. In the end, I just repeated myself for the fifth time, turned around, and walked away. And then you have people like that writing posts about how doctors are "so-and-so." These situations are just everyday life for medical pros, but people just don't get it. They don't realize that working with people is hands down the hardest part of the job. If doctors actually tried to meet every single demand people have, they’d all just burn out, and then we’d genuinely have no one left to take care of us... and I also totally agree with your post about how under certain conditions, doctors are just going to pack up and leave... and honestly, the European Union being involved might actually help since it would mean removing the Schengen border. Anyone choosing to head out isn't wrong for doing what they've always done, now or in the future...

Kate Collins67 said:Sure, you need to draw a line, but let’s be real—after being awake for 24 hours straight, I’m basically floating through space and those lines start to get pretty blurry.

Exactly... And then you're stuck trying to explain exactly why you prescribed a specific medication, or just constantly worrying that someone’s going to take offense because they didn't get every single bit of information handed to them on a silver platter just the way they expected... 🙄

It’s like doctors have become total servants to their patients, instead of just being regular people made of flesh and blood...