Incompetence
Friday night Honor was having these horrible coughing fits where he couldn’t stop. I gave him some over the counter medicine which didn’t help. Foreseeing that we’d be up all night with a coughing, miserable baby, I called the doctor for some stronger medicine.
The nurse called me back and told me to go get a different over the counter medicine. I clarified with her that it was NOT the same as what I’d been giving him. I get to the pharmacy and, lo and behold, the EXACT same ingredients.
I was livid. If I’d not been proactive and just gave him what I was told to give him, he’d have gotten a double dose of the medicine. I called her back to complain. She argued with me for 5 minutes that it wasn’t the same thing. Finally I said to her, “what am I supposed to do? He’s just coughing and coughing?” She said, “You should probably bring him in.” I asked if the doctor would just call something in and she said that he wouldn’t prescribe something for an infant unless he saw him. (Pshaw! Infant?? He’s 17 months old! The Incompetence!!)
So, 8pm Friday night, I dragged Honor into the After Hours clinic, only to be told that they don’t EVER give little kids like him prescription cough meds. WHAT IN THE WORLD!!!??? What a waste of a trip. I would NEVER have brought him in if the stupid nurse had not led me to believe that he could get some HELP out of the whole trip.
I simple phone conversation with the doctor could have saved me all the trouble. I think next time I’m going to insist that I talk directly with the doctor.
Category: Honor 4 comments »
February 21st, 2005 at 3:11 pm
Dealing with people when your child is sick can be infuriating. Mine is sick right now with a 41 degree fever and diarrea. Fun. However, I am lucky that where I live we have a 24 hour line directly to a registered nurse who will not only give great advice and call back to make sure things are fine, but will come out to our house. All at no charge. I hope his cough gets better for you. Poor little guy. Good Luck!
February 21st, 2005 at 7:50 pm
i just wrote about this very same thing!
http://littlebear_holler.blogspot.com/2005/02/why-i-dont-trust-doctors-rant.html#comments
February 22nd, 2005 at 2:09 pm
Gawd! No kidding–this happens to me all the time. You really need to keep your wits about you when dealing with some people. It’s frustrating when these are the people you need to rely on for much of your medical advice.
What a waste of a co-pay!
February 22nd, 2005 at 8:58 pm
woah.. when i read the title of this post i thought it said “impotence”. not that we would EVAR have a problem with that mindy you.. it was just a little dis-concerting ;)