Shoot yourself daily, but Don't Shoot the RT,

The RN was set up alongside the bed with her IV set, and he had just pulled out another failed attempt. As I entered the room the loquacious patient said, "I think we ought to just shoot the RT!"

"Why would you want to do that," I said.

"Because I'm bored," she said. I looked down at her dry, flaky and pale white feet with those long, yellow nails. This lady had every drug related disease in the book I figured, and I wasn't going to get any closer to her than I had to.

"I have three little kids who would be very, very sad if I wasn't around in the morning."

"Well, I suppose you have a point-- ouch! Can you be a little more gentle!" She was glaring down as the RN repositioned her second attempt. "Why don't you poke under here," she pointed to under her arm pit. "You're probably best off poking me where I haven't been already. I can't reach under here."

The expression of the nurse never changed. I could tell she had had it with this body abuser. She said, "You wouldn't want one under there."

The patient said, "It's not like I havent' poked myself everywhere else."

I gave the patient a breathing treatment and when I was done she said she wanted another. I'm sure if she were home that's exactly what she would have done. But she wasn't short of breath, so I put my neb away and left the room.

Here this lady is admitted so we can fix her and the government can pay for it, only for her to go back home and poke herself some more.

Fortunately all I had to do was one treatment and I was done with this patient.

He's refusing the one thing that would save her

"Hello, Mr. Smith?" Dr. Vanity was a heavy set man, messy dark hair on the sides, balding on top. As I looked down at him I could see sweat beads running down his scalp, which was the irony about it all considering it was snowing and blowing outside and I was wearing my lab coat because I was freezing.

"This is Dr. Steven Vanity from Shoreline Medical...

"Yep... Yes... that's what I wanted to talk to you about. Yep... Well, her hemoglobin has been about 6 for the past two weeks, but she seems to be taking a turn for the... yep... yeah... and that's what I wanted to talk to you about...

"You see, her hemoglobin has dropped now to 5. She has a temperature of 102 right now, and we're having trouble keeping it down. I hate to say this to you, but she's taking a backward step here, and, really, the only thing that's going to help her is if we give her some blood..."

He leaned back in his chair. He took a deep breath, wiped his brow. "I'm just to the point there's not much I can do for her if we don't give her blood....

"Hello... Hello..." He set the receiver down. He turned to look at me. "Well, I guess he wanted none of that."

"What, did he hang up on you," I said.

"Yep." He puckered his lip, wiped his brow again. "I told him she needed blood for me even to have a chance to save her, and he said, 'okay,' and hung up."

"Well, I guess you document that and do your best."

"It's unfortunate," he said, swinging his chair around and setting his feet on an empty chair. He wiped his brow again. "I really like that lady. I'd hate to see her go. She's only 51. She's young enough her body would have a fighting chance if only we could use the tools we have."

I placed my hands in my pockets, twiddling a vial of Ventolin in my pocket, and said nothing. The doctor sighed. That about says it all.

"My hands are tied," he said.