Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Doctors succeed in making me paranoid sometimes

I often wonder if there are really, really bad transcriptionists out there that are giving us all a bad name or if some doctors really think we're idiots. Maybe it's a little bit of both. I'm sitting here typing this report and the doctor keeps spelling really odd things. Like the patient has packing in his nares. He spelled p*a*c*k*i*n*g and n*a*r*e*s. Okay, granted it could have been just one nostril but not sure what word might have taken the place of packing. He also spelled perfused, bowel, and bike for me. Yeah, I've been able to spell bike since I've been able to ride one but whatever. He also proceeded to make sure I had the proper abbreviation for EMS, PACU, and PMI.

All of these odd little make-sure-I-get-it-right things makes me wonder if doctors do this because they've had someone who actually got these sorts of things wrong or if they're just having a pissy day and want to take it out on whoever may be typing at the other end of the dictation. By the time I get to the end of these types of reports where everything has been spelled out for me (but they fail to spell out the things that may actually be helpful) I begin to get paranoid that I'm spelling things incorrectly or using the wrong abbreviation and that I'm going to be the cause of his next spell-everything-out tirade. I start to feel like I need to add a shot of Irish Cream to my coffee and it's only 8:30 in the morning. Sheesh, I think I need a pee break.

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