Foolish Me

I seem to be making an absolute fool out of myself more frequently these days. I wonder why.

The other day, when I was on call, I actually contacted the consultant who was at home having his dinner, to inform him of a patient whom I was pretty worried about. She was a young lady with funny movement in her left arm, power of about 2/5 in both legs, horizontal nystagmus and GCS 14. Although she was not hyperventilating, her arterial blood gases showed marked respiratory alkalosis. I thought about an urgent CT scan of her brain, therefore, I wanted to discuss this over with the consultant first.

This consultant of mine, is actually the consultant whom I have been attached with since I started working in this hospital. I told him about this patient, and I SWEAR, I heard that he thinks she may have a subdural haematoma. So I asked him, "So you wanna CT her tomorrow?" He said, "Yes."

Horror of all horror, when I went to work the next day, I met up with him to discuss about a few of his patients whom I have reviewed during the ward round. He revealed to me that, "I actually wanted the CT urgent, not the next day. She had it done at midnight yesterday."

I was like "oOpppsss." I asked how did he find out that she didnt get a CT scan in the first place. He told me he contacted the ward to find out whether this lady had been for the scan, and as soon as he knew she hadn't, he requested for one.

I couldn't feel any sillier (if there is such a word). I made a total fool of myself. I kept thinking over the telephone conversation I had with him...sigh...but what is the point eh?

Glad to find out that her CT brain was normal. *phew. Imagine if she actually did have something serious, I would probably just kill myself.

To make matters worse, I told him about a middle aged lady who was admitted with diarrhoea and vomiting, who I thought actually had aspiration pneumonia, because she has been vomiting persistently for like 10 days. He laughed. He said, "How could a young lady get aspiration pneumonia?"

I was abit dumbfounded. I thought aspiration pneumonia happens when your saliva or your vomit or when anything went down the wrong tract (like vomitus too). He laughed further. hmm... and then, I soon realised how foolish I was! How could a fit and healthy lady get aspiration pneumonia, especially when she has no problems with swallowing?! But then again, how do explain cases where healthy patients get admitted because of aspiration of foreign objects, which most often affect the right lung, just because the right bronchus is more vertical than the left?

tsk tsk tsk. i dunno.

sawling, sawling, you really need to stop being so silly and foolish. Silly mistakes you make when you're not thinking properly. hehe.