Classic one liners….

Ahhh, so that’s what I did wrong in the club on Friday night.

*makes mental note to leave the stamp collection at home next time*

That is a great little story, Mr Ian.

I’m sure I’m not the only one with stories …. I was hoping someone might pick up the thread and run with it…..

But, in the absence of anyone else so far….

A patient with Acquired Brain Injury (ABI) became aggressive, hitting a co-patient. He was restrained and secluded (used to be quite common initial response to go straight to seclusion - do not pass go). Anyhow, following a reasonably brief period, the psych registrar came to do the formal review and engaged with the patient in a debrief. The following is a ‘re-enactment’ of the conversation that was summarised in the notes.

Imagine the conversation below with some generous pauses between question and answer as he genuinely tries to give his honest answers…..

Doc: “What happened?”

Pt: “He got me angry, so I hit him”

Doc: “Are you angry now?”

Pt: “No”

Doc: “Do you think you’d be ok to go back onto the ward?”

Pt: “Yes”

Doc: “If he gets you angry again, are you going to hit him again?”

Pt: “No”

Doc: “If he upsets you again, what might you do differently?”

… longest pause….

Pt: “I’ll headbutt him”.

Okay, here’s one from one of my patients.

Patient: “What sort of uniform do you wear?”

Me: “I don’t wear a uniform.”

Patient: “Well, that just shows how low you are.”

And who can argue with that, eh?

Lol, classic Z!

Oh blimey, funny stories from the ward…

One patient used to sit slumped in the chair all day, and apart from the occasional complaint of “There’s nothing in me” he didn’t speak to anyone. Lack of social interaction was an understatement; he seemed completely oblivious to the world around him. He seriously self neglected himself too, and smelt very badly.

Male Nurse: Dave I need to speak to you in private.
Dave: (no response, which was his usual response, he didn’t even glance up)
Male Nurse: Dave, are you listening to me? I need to speak to you privately.
Dave: (no response)
Male Nurse: If you don’t come with me I’ll have to say what I need to say in front of everyone.
Dave: (no response)
Male Nurse: Fine. I have to tell you that it is not acceptable to expose yourself to a female member of staff, and if it happens again we will call the police. Do you understand Dave?

Well, everyone just stared in silence, trying not to laugh. I can’t imagine poor Dave even mustering up the motivation to drop his trousers…

Well, I can think of funny stories, but not one-liners. And the funny stories I can think of don’t translate well - you had to be there.

As an SHO speaking with a young lad with mania admitted on a Saturday morning, going through risk assessment :

“Of course everything’s safe right now. I’m stopping all the trains from crashing.”

Being competent

Or not.

In my medical student final exams, surgical cases, speaking with a young lady who’d had 3 children and had incontinence :

“So, can you tell me about your incompetence?”

Thankfully she burst in to hysterics and thought it was the funniest thing ever, and precisely what her husband had been telling her for years.

Many years ago there was a patient on the elderly ward I worked on who had served right through the First World War, then built up a small but successful business and had been an inventor with several patents to his name. One day the consultant showed us a letter she had received from his daughter who lived in America and had no contact with her father, and asked for advice on how to reply. The letter said that she was concerned about funeral costs, etc, after he died, and thought that it would be appropriate to have his body boiled down and the skeleton sold to a medical student, because “he was no use alive so he may as well be some use when he’s dead”.

Answers on a postcard please.

I would suggest the daughter may benefit from speaking to someone about her anger towards her father. I should imagine all the patents in the world are no compensation for a parent who has not fulfilled the role you might expect of them as their child.