One of the ER bloggers a while back mentioned something about “knowing how to talk to surgeons on the phone,” and I didn’t know what he was talking about. I do now.

There is nothing more annoying, in the middle of the night (or a busy day), than to get an ER doctor trying to give you a five-minute presentation on a patient. I really do not care what time the patient went to the outside hospital, or how exactly they got transferred here; unless the creatinine is 3, I don’t care what the chemistry shows; unless you have a positive urinalysis, and are apologizing for calling me anyway, I don’t care what the urinalysis showed (yes, sterile pyuria – white cells and no bacteria – can help confirm a diagnosis of appendicitis; on the phone, I still don’t care); unless you got a CT scan without asking us (which would be ok, if it shows appendicitis), I don’t care if you got xrays on a patient whom you think has appendicitis; I also do not care which ADHD and asthma meds the kid is on (unless they include high-dose oral steroids); I don’t care whether (when calling for appendicitis), you think the abdomen is distended or not, or whether Rovsing’s sign is positive or negative. All I really want to know is, what room is the patient in, and a name or medical record number, so I can track them down when they change rooms. Apart from that, you can be as impressed as you like by the abdominal exam; you could think they have peritonitis. I don’t care, I have to touch it for myself, and until you give me a room number I can’t do that! (At my own hospital, about half the ER residents, I would care what they think about whether the patient is truly surgical or not; here, I haven’t had time to learn to trust the ER staff, so. . . I don’t care whether they think there’s rebound or not.)

Bottom line: you called the surgeons because you want us to touch the patient. So give me the location of the pain, and the location of the patient, and stop talking. The best calls are from the male PAs, who usually are not too chatty: name, age, medical record number, chief complaint, white count, “I think it’s real” or “I’m not sure, just come see.” End of conversation.

Unfortunately, I don’t know a polite way to say that to attendings, fellows, or residents I don’t know (ie the entire ER staff at the children’s hospital),  so I get very frustrated at night.

I’m also puzzled by this: the surgery resident’s ethos puts a lot of stock in instant response: if you call me with a consult, I will be there in five minutes if I’m not doing something important; and if I’m in the OR, I will be there five minutes after the end of the case. (And if the nurses call, I will address their concern immediately if it’s urgent, or as soon as it comes up on my triage list otherwise.) In fact, sometimes it’s the only thing that keeps me going at night: I can’t think straight, I’m not sure which elevator goes where, or what floor I’m on or am trying to get to, but I will be in the ER two minutes after getting called. So why do the ER people call, then act surprised when I show up? Or why do the general peds teams call us at night with a consult “for you to see in the morning”? If you call me now, I will see it now; I will not save work for the morning. If you don’t want the patient and family woken up at 11pm, don’t call me at 11pm. (I know some residents aren’t like this, but it’s not just me, because I learned this from the chiefs getting angry at me if I wasn’t ready to report on a consult within ten minutes of getting the call, or the first time they heard about it, whichever came sooner.)

Ok, I’ll stop being grouchy now. I hope I have any personality left at all when I get away from this hospital.