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#appointment, #compassion, #depression, #doctor, #dr, #empathy, #funny, #impolite #bizzare, #laughter, #life, #lol, #NHS, #painful, #wet, Deo, Deodorant, God, Google, Health, Monday, Thursday, WordPress
However, I called and the first available appointment with Dr. Deo, was booked for Thursday, June 20th, at 340pm.
My wife and I arrived at Cedar Surgery at 330pm, on the 20th. I signed myself in electronically on the efficient touch-screen at the reception and we took ourselves to the upstairs waiting room just as the friendly gadget asked me to do. Twenty minutes later the ticker-tape-type display high on the wall of the waiting room announced that I was to make my way to Dr. Deo, Room 5.
We got up, took a right and then another right and knocked on the door. My wife and I made our way in.
We greeted the doctor. Dr. Deo greeted us.
I sat in the chair closest to the doctor’s desk; my wife sat on my left between my chair and the sink.
“How can I help you?” Dr. Deo asked.
“I don’t know,” I said, “you asked me to come. I received a note asking me to make this appointment with you.”
The doctor looked puzzled.
“Did I send the note?” she asked.
“No, the reception sent me this note here.” I took my phone out as I had a picture of the note. I handed her my phone with the note on the display.
Dr. Deo read it, frowned and said “it must have been my colleague who requested this. Let me look at your records to see what it’s about.”
As the doctor looked at her computer screen for a few seconds I asked if there was anything more powerful than ‘Piriton Liquid’ that I could take for my hay-fever?
“There are many things,” she replied without looking up from the screen. For a second I thought her dry response was a joke. As it turned out that was all she would ever say on the matter.
“Right,” she continued “I see here that you’re to have follow up therapy in six months time for your depression. And I need to ask you if you’d like to take medication to deal with your anger. That’s what I think this is about.”
“But,” I said, “I have an appointment with Dr. Swamy, for this for next Monday. Dr. Swamy saw me two weeks ago and asked me to see her on the 24th, to discuss this.”
“So there’s nothing else.” Dr. Deo said abruptly.
“Well, what else can I see you for,” I thought out-loud trying to sound friendly so as to at least make the most of the administrative blunder which had brought me there.
“There doesn’t need to be anything else”, said Dr. Deo, dryly. I ignored her flippant attitude as best I could.
A that moment my wife stood up and said, “this chair is wet.”
The chair next to mine, the one by the sink, was soaking and had drenched my partner’s trousers. The doctor acted as if nothing had happened. My wife realized I was distressed at her having gotten all wet and quietly said “it’s all right,” and just stood there in her sodden trousers.
I turned to the doctor and said, “actually there’s this spot on my leg.” It is a tiny bright-red growth that has concerned me since I first saw it on my calf about three weeks ago. I was wearing shorts so I was able to put my leg up close to the table and show her.
“It’s nothing,” said the doctor in a millisecond.
Again, taken aback yet not reacting I tried to make light of the situation. “So it’s nothing I’m going to die of tomorrow?” I asked.
Silence.
“Right,” I said confused at the doctor’s dismissive attitude and lack of consideration. I was still trying to make up for my time and the journey to the surgery; after all we’re given 10 minutes for an official appointment and we’d been with her for about 3, not to mention that I had rearranged my plans for the day to attend the unnecessary meeting I had been called to.
“Yes, one more thing,” I said remembering a question a friend of mine had suggested I ask my GP regarding my depression, “do you know anything about ‘key-workers’? Do I get referred to them by my GP?”
“No I don’t. Google it. Google is a great source of informantion,” said Dr. Deo.
My wife and I were in shock at the doctor’s rude lack of kindness, manners and professionalism.
The situation was so awkward that in my experience there was no adequate reaction that fit.
“Well, I can see you’re very busy so we’d better leave,” I said.
“Not at all,” replied the sarcastic doctor.
I got up and walked out after my wife who had left before me.
It wasn’t until the car park when I said to my wife, “that was bizarre.”
“She is very rude,” she responded, “I couldn’t believe the tension in there. Are you ok?”
I wasn’t and I was. I was confused and saddened by the encounter yet imagined that the doctor must be going through some difficult times herself and was just stressed out. That is the best thing I could imagine. It is what I chose to believe. If anything depression has given me a degree of empathy and compassion for people who are being anti-social, like I can sometimes be when the world inside of me gets too dark to be polite.