Tales from the Emergency Room (13 page)

Jokes

Over the years I saw patients who loved to tell me jokes—almost all new to me. I tried to remember some of the best ones, but I might hear so many in a day that it was hard to keep track. By far, the best joke tellers were women, one in particular, Trudy, who heard the stories at her bridge games. And they were raunchy and she couldn’t wait to try them out on me. I also had a Jewish patient whose husband I got to know and who told particularly Jewish jokes. The week I retired, a long-time patient came in for her treatment and handed me a book-length folder of jokes which her husband had collected. He wanted me to have a copy. I was touched by the gesture. Another patient, an elderly Irishman this time and a severe asthmatic, always came prepared with a story or two. His jokes ranged from ethnic through just plain smutty, and, since he spoke with a booming voice, I always saw him behind closed doors, or, at least got up and closed them if he indicated a story was forthcoming. My friends often wanted to know where I got all my stories (the ones I dared to tell) and they would nod knowingly when I said that I heard them from my patients.

Shooting Up

My wife and I had dear friends who were a black couple with two children. The mother had also been a patient for awhile when her son became a patient as well. He was a very tall, gawky teenager at the time. His mother was a stunning beauty. As I frequently called the patients in from the waiting room myself, I always got a kick out of this lady saying to her son, “OK, let’s go in and shoot up together!” This invariably brought surprised if not shocked looks from the other people in the waiting room.

Mr. Universe

A young man, a former Mr. Universe, came to see me in White Plains. He was a pleasant patient. But, when I went to place some skin tests in his upper arm, I couldn’t help but comment that I was unlikely to run out of room for the tests. His upper arm was as big around as my thigh, and I am not a small person.

College Kids

I was bemoaning the fact that I had 3 children in college at the same time to a patient in White Plains who was the CEO of an international firm situated in Westchester County. I knew that if one listened hard enough from the waiting room that conversations in one of the treatment rooms in the office could be faintly overheard. In addition, we called all patients out of the waiting room by title and last name (a practice apparently forbidden in the South). The patient noted that he had five children in college at that point! Why five? It seems he had adopted his brother’s children after his brother and his wife had been killed in a car accident. His kids were all about the same age whereas mine were not and I would not have three in school except for one year. The amusing part came when the next patient, a woman, came into the treatment room and announced that seeing as who he was he could surely afford to pay for five kids in college at the same time! And, she was right.

Cat Stories

Both of these tales are rather sad.

Very early on in my practice, I tested a little girl for possible cat allergy. She was highly positive, cat immunotherapy was not very good at the time and so I advised, as usual, that eliminating the cat from the household would be the wisest course, if not the only the reasonable one. The little girl’s mother announced that the cat was hers and that the little girl would have to go. My secretary heard the pronouncement and later told me that she had all she could do to keep from interrupting the conversation to give the mother a well-deserved piece of her mind. So, the little girl, about 9 years old, was sent to live with her grandmother in an animal-free household to overcome her problem, and, presumably to live happily ever after.

A similar story came up not long thereafter, but in this case, a slightly older girl already knew what the problem was, confirmed by testing, and begged her mother to let her go to live with her grandmother. The mother readily agreed. This mother might have been able to make sufficient adjustments in the home environment to accommodate her daughter and the cat, but we never knew since the child went to live elsewhere. From these two stories I learned a lot about the lengths people will go to to retain their relationship with their animals and afterward I was less often taken aback when similar problems arose.

The Christmas Tree

There was a young girl who would now be called a tween, who had asthma. She knew that she had more trouble with her breathing whenever there was a real Christmas tree in the house. One night, she took the situation into her own hands. Having enough sense to drag the tree, fully decorated, through the front door bottom first, she deposited it on the lawn outside and went back to bed. I thought that she had behaved terrifically well. Her parents got the message.

A Red-headed Girl

Often patients would park their cars on a side street opposite my White Plains office. To get back and forth they had to cross a very busy road leading into town. One day, I had given shots to a pretty young girl with a massive amount of curly red hair. After she left the office with her mother, we thought we heard sirens, but the office was situated in such a way as to insulate us from street noises. We learned that upon crossing the road, my patient was struck by a car. It turned out that, though she was known to have hit her head on the hood of the car in the accident according to her mother who saw the whole thing, she was saved from a very serious impact by her bountiful red hair which acted a cushion for her head. She did, however, fracture her pelvis, for which she spent some time in the hospital. I visited her, of course, and her family, and made arrangements for her mother to park next to my office door in future. When I think of it now, it was a wonder that in over thirty years, no one else from my practice was ever injured crossing the White Plains Post Road.

A Red-headed Lady

While I was still working for my professor, whose partner I would soon become, I met a fascinating lady. She had been a patient for awhile. She had henna-dyed hair, done up in various startling ways and often wore outlandish makeup and clothes. She was tall and stately, especially in her high heels. She spoke in a very formal way to everyone, though I knew she was not snobbish. I always used her last name when I addressed her. I would often meet her on my way across town to the office since she lived in an area on the West Side near Columbus Circle through which I passed almost daily. I remember her initially because she would arrive in the office carrying a box of Kleenex tissues. She had such severe allergic rhinitis that she was never without the tissues. Eventually I knew we were making progress with her therapy because she did not always have her Kleenex with her. Eventually she was able to go about without her tissues at all. I remember reminiscing with her about the Kleenex when, years later we would meet on the street. We would both have a chuckle over that.

The Yellow Tie

For many years we employed a female allergist to help us in the office. She was a Holocaust survivor, educated in Vienna and the USA. Her English was impeccable, but she did have a slight accent. One day I arrived in the office wearing a bright yellow tie. She took one look and exclaimed, “Oh, you’re wearing your cannery tie!” I subsequently figured out that she meant “canary” tie. We had a good laugh and ever after when anyone wore yellow in the office, we would refer to the color as “cannery”.

Rotary Phones

My office had to be one of the last to obtain touch-tone phones. Kids would come in for their shots and then, after waiting the prescribed time, ask to call their parents for a ride home. My secretary, who got a charge out of it, would invite them around the window into the office and show them which rotary phone to use. They would stand there and gape, having never seen such a contraption. Lois would then show them that they used their finger to pick a number, twirl the dial, let it come back to rest and then repeat the procedure until the number was dialed. The kids were amazed and we all had a good time over this. However, a new touch-tone phone system in the office did away with this pleasure eventually. My own children agreed that I had now arrived in the 20th century. Recently a patient announced that she had found me on the Internet. How impressed are my children now?

An Attitude

One day a woman came into the waiting room as she had done several times before, glanced around and noted a black person waiting there. She marched up to the desk and informed my secretary that she would not be seated with any black person and stormed out. She immediately became an ex-patient of mine. It was a good thing that she left before I got wind of her attitude because she would have had to endure a piece of my mind, for which I undoubtedly would have wound up in trouble!

Mr. A.

One of my patients was difficult for several reasons. He had horrific asthma and was thoroughly non-compliant, he was a lawyer who didn’t pay my bill without extensive dunning and he kept me on the telephone endlessly, at no charge. He, of course, would have been billing his time. One day, we were with another couple on the ferry to Nova Scotia from Bar Harbor, Maine when I went to the dining room. There he sat with his wife and his daughter. There was no way I could avoid them, and so I passed the time of day and went on. I heard his daughter say with great insight, “Daddy, he’s trying to get away from you!” and, indeed, I was. The cruise passed uneventfully with regard to this patient and when we debarked I felt a sense of relief. That sense didn’t last very long. We arrived at our lodgings, and after a drink on the lawn, went into the dining room. We were seated right next to my difficult patient and his family! As they were leaving his wife leaned over to me and said, cheerfully, “We’re not going to tell you where we are staying tomorrow night.” She knew. In the end he didn’t have a problem during the night and we did not run across him again on our trip. I learned later that he and his wife had parted company, and eventually, he and I and I parted company as well.

An Airline Employee

One of my favorite patients was a lovely woman with a sharp wit. She worked for Delta Airlines. Her name was Dorothy Degan and she manned the Death Desk for the airline. This was where passengers were able to book flights quickly, change scheduled flights, etc, often because someone in their family was dead or dying. All day long, Dorothy said into the phone, “Dorothy Degan Delta Death Desk”. How she managed to do this without losing her composure, I’m not sure, but I am sure she managed to help those in real need and was readily able to weed out the imposters.

Neighborliness

My associate was not given to angry outbursts. But one time, just after I had begun working in his office, I heard him raise his voice to a patient. I couldn’t wait to see what that was all about. Then I heard him say, “Well, there’s no sense paying me. Let your neighbor take care of you.” It turned out of course, that the lady was not doing what he had advised her to do but, instead, had decided to treat herself the way her neighbor told her to. Over the years I had non-compliant patients, but they usually did not do what they should have on their own advice. I was never able to use his line, but I would have loved to! I know of one physician in Philadelphia who responds to these patients with a sign in his office: “The quality of your care depends upon who is the doctor, you or me!”

Giving the Baby Back

There was a young lady whom I had seen for many years who got married and was unable to conceive. So, she decided to adopt a baby. She seemed to know all about the baby girl who was brand new. It seems that the new Mama was adept at reading written material upside down and had followed along as the adoption people reviewed the child’s chart before releasing her to her new mother. About two years later, she adopted a baby boy. She assured me that she knew all about the boy—same upside down reading technique. But, at around 6 months of age, the child began to thrive less and less well. Indeed, as I saw the family, I could tell that the child’s development was very slow. When I asked the mother how she felt about this, she said that she and her husband were going to give the baby back! I had no idea that that could be done. About this time, the mother’s treatment ended and I lost track of her and the children. Then, when the boy was about three years old, he appeared in my office with his mother, healthy, active, bright and obviously excellently developed. Luckily, before I had a chance to ask, Mama said that, yes, this was the same child that almost got given back. No one knew why his development had slowed or why he was now thriving, but we all agreed that it had been a close thing. I have often wondered if his mother ever told him about how close he came to being returned.

Global Amnesia

A lovely, very intelligent 60-65 year old patient of mine went with her husband to a business convention of his in another city. While he was out, at some point she lost her memory completely. She did not know who she was, where she was or any other pertinent information. Plainly she saw that she was in a hotel room, that she was married and that she was with her husband presumably since men’s apparel items were nearby. So, she waited. Eventually, her husband returned and she realized that it was going to be impossible for her to keep her amnesia a secret. Of course, she very quickly wound up in the hospital with a diagnosis of global amnesia, the cause of which was never uncovered. Over several days she recovered completely (characteristic of this problem) and while I knew her she never had a recurrence or any other serious neurological problems. She did not relate the story in a humorous fashion however since it been such a frightening experience.

The Cop

One day a lady came into the treatment room from the waiting room, with what looked to me like a nervous smile. It seems that she had been followed all the way to the office by a police car, certain that the cop was on her tail for a reason. The more so when he turned into the parking lot right after she did. It never occurred to her that he might be coming to get his allergy shots. Not even when he arrived in the waiting room after she did. I guess she was having a little episode of paranoia, but we ended up laughing about it and I introduced her to the officer who was a patient and a good friend of mine.