Sunday, November 9, 2008

Lateral Epicondylitis

Thanks to encouragement from friends and family I'm writing about work, again.
There is a new nurse supervisor in the building. She seems quite benign. She had a bit of a problem reading my handwriting (she isn't the first and definitely not the last) and then comprehending the content but she's new and may not be familiar with the procedures followed in this facility.

Then, my lateral epicondylitis aka tennis elbow started acting up again. By midday I couldn't write anymore without feeling acute pain so I decided to ice my forearm a bit to get some relief.

Since this facility is run on a tight budget (read: no ice packs in the gym) I went to staff cafeteria to get some ice, put it into a disposable glove, and thus ice my forearm. I was about to start putting ice into the glove when I saw the new supervisor coming up with a cup. I told her to go ahead since I'd take a while. She looked at me and said 'You're going to eat your ice from a glove?!"
I smiled at her joke but she continued, wincing a bit "You know, the ice isn't going to taste so good from that glove". Then she turned around and went on to eat her lunch.
And as I poured the ice into my glove I wondered 1- how many years was this woman fooling the system/has shebeen falling through the cracks all this time? 2- poor poor residents whose care she'll be supervising...

1 comment:

Barb Chansky said...

The perfect sample of what is wrong with our health system in general, and a perfect speciman of Obama's electorate.