I forgot my patient.

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The most shameful thing happen to me today.

It is actually started last week when i clerk this patient and i found out that she have relatives somewhere in my hometown and she keeps telling me that she know my family. Maybe she made a mistake however, i do realize that she did have relatives in my village. So i sit and spend some more time with her talking about my family and village. It has been a long time since I use my Brunei dialect so i have fun chattering with her.

And today, as usual i woke up at 5.45 am, prepare myself to go to the hospital, took some dull rushing breakfast, then i was there in the hospital early in the morning. full with my fully equipped medical student gear consist of stethoscope, log book, a pen torch, a few blank paper as a clerking sheets, and i walk to the ward confident to clerk patient. And the first room i went is my usual room that has been allocated to me. The first patient i saw was a lady sitting on the bed. I quickly approach to her and ask her name. She gave me her name. I start talking to her lightly and in quarter way of our conversation, she suddenly said, " I think my son really know your family. My son working in Labuan hospital".

Now i am feeling so awkward. Now i realize that i am clerking the same patient i have clerked last week. patient which i spent extra times because she kind of knew my family. I am totally ****. How could I? She remember me but i don't remember her. it was so rude of me.

I don't know why i could not easily remember a person face. it was hard to me. I hardly remember the face of all my patient, except a few of them. Since a long time ago, there are a lot of people who know me but i could not remember them. This problem continue until now.

I don't know what to say to that lady. Luckily i have this skill of rapidly changing my status from a total stranger to become a close friend, fakely, but effectively. So i did. I did talk with the patient again.

However, at the exact momment i am writing this entry, i am trying to remember that patient face again, but i could not. I guess i have to live with this 'disability'. At least i did try to remember them. At least i remember their problem. I guess i can live with that.

Comments

  1. Henry Lee4:46 am

    well.. in ur case, last resort u can say... i have thousands of patients a day. I can't really remember all of them in a single day.. it wil take time... LOL... there goes the life of a doctor.... take care bro

    ReplyDelete

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