Thursday, December 28, 2006

Jingle Blargh

I'm so glad that's over. Words cannot describe my 'Christmas'. I'm exhausted to the point of tears (and spent my break locked in the lavs at work yesterday, sobbing like a small child). Here are my highlights:

  • being called a 'vile racist' for saying the 'C********' word, when explaining why someone could not see an emergency dentist for a loose tooth at 22:00 on the 25th
  • drunk people, needing ambulances, but not knowing where they were on holiday
  • trying to understand why someone would call at midnight on the 25th, when we had an 8 hour callback time for non-urgent calls, because she was concerned that her skull was not perfectly smooth like an egg

Dear reader, I only wish these stories were fabricated. After four days of this mindbending idiocy I have lost all faith in humanity. I intend to spend the next three days drinking until the room spins, and eating curry!

Posted by Sick Sad Minion at Thursday, December 28, 2006 | | Comments

Sunday, December 17, 2006

Everyone's a f***ing comedian.



Yep, you heard it, there's nothing like a bad situation to bring out the idiot best in people. You'll be surprised at what people laugh about when they're on the phone to me. Often callers aren't aware of how serious some conditions can become, some people are just naturally stupid.

Here are some things that I consider to be funny:

Things that I fail to see the humour in include:


  • 18 year old students called Tabitha, from the Home Counties, in stitches because their friend Araminta has taken seventeen temazepam and can't stop walking into walls and talking about penguins
  • A drunk woman chuckling about her two year old boy who can only walk in circles and has "forgot all his words" since a garden gate fell onto his head at a family barbecue three days previously
  • The babysitter who accidentally gave her 11 year old charge two tramadol for her period pain instead of paracetamol, and finds it endlessly amusing that the child in question keeps scratching her own nose and falling over
  • The father who rubbed Karvol on his baby's face and was very entertained at the fact that "The skin is all red, like he's pissed or something!"

and finally:


  • The mother who sat and watched her toddler drink the contents of a Glade liquid air-freshener, and giggled because "her breath smells exactly like lavender!" When asked why she'd allowed this to happen, she exclaimed "It's made of natural ingredients!"
*sigh*

I fear for the human race, I truly do!


Posted by Sick Sad Minion at Sunday, December 17, 2006 | | Comments

Sunday, December 10, 2006

Interlude

A cheery insert, because occasionally I get to have a laugh. People assume that because we answer their calls that we've been lobotomised and drugged. We were also raised in lab conditions and know nothing of the outside world.

Sadly I can't disclose exact details, it'd almost certainly unmask me, but you'll get my drift! I'll obscure it by using fictional symptoms and a made up name.

Me: Good afternoon Worried Well, my name's Lowly Callgimp, how may I help?

Curiously Afflicted : Oh yes, I mean you won't be able to because you don't know about this sort of thing, but I'll explain it anyway.

Me : [thinking 'Thank you Oh Gracious One'] Oh please do.

CA : Well I have this condition, it's incredibly rare, so rare you won't have heard of it. It's not fashionable enough to be on telly all the time HAHA! Anyway it causes diminishing eyelashes, blue dandruff, swollen toena....

Me : Oh yeah, Von Wallpaperen's syndrome?

CA : [stunned silence] I.. I hadn't finished.

Me : Is it though?

CA : YES. How do you KNOW? I expect it was in one of your women's magazines, was it?

Me : I've had it for years.

CA : No you HAVEN'T, you can't have!

Me : I have, I promise.

CA : I don't think so, prove it!!

Me : OK I have to take crushed up blue smarties, and I've had a pelmet fitted.

CA : I don't believe you. You're reading from a screen.

Me : [sighs] I really have, I promise, so fortunately I know a bit of background. Tell me your exact query and one of our Health Information Team can research it for you.

CA : It doesn't matter, GOODBYE!

[click]

Aww. I guess it's not much fun finding out you're not a precious, unique snowflake after all.

Posted by Sick Sad Minion at Sunday, December 10, 2006 | | Comments

Once in a Full Moon

I occasionally get an eight hour shift so chock-full of idiocy that I wish for Armageddon. Calls so stupid, and upsetting, and laughable that I have to wonder what the Hell is in the water supply. Judge for yourself.


Sugar Baby Love

Me : Good afternoon, you're through to McDonalds, can I take your order?

Sugar Mummy : My little boy is three. He has terrible toothache, he's on the maximum dose of Calpol and Calprofen, but he's still crying.

Me: I'll ask a few questions, then we'll see how we can help him today. Poor little thing, toothache's bad enough when you know what's going on.

SM : Oh yes please, it's awful to see him in pain.

Me : [runs through ABCs, checks for recent injuries/dental treatment] OK, I've found an EDS in your area that will probably see him tonight, it opens at 6pm, [gives number]

SM : But that's two hours! He has an appointment for tomorrow morning, but he's in pain now, it's been going on for two months. Do you think it could have anything to with with the fact that all his teeth are black and sort-of stumpy looking?

Me : [choking back hostility] Call the EDS, they'll be able to give better pain-relief advice.

SM : OK thanks, haha, kids and their sweets eh?

[click]

Poor little fella. A future CMHT referral there I think.


Computer says 'No'


Me : Good Evening, House of Idiot. My name's Suicidal Ideation, and I'm not sure how I got here, how can I help?

God Help Him : Oh Hi yeah, I can't find the phone number for my GP. I need to see him tomorrow about some vaccinations for my gap year in nepal.

Me : Not a problem, which practice are you registered with? [opens NHS UK and enters patient postcode]

GHH : I don't know.

Me : Um.. do you know your GP's name?

GHH : [irritated] NO

Me : Which street is it on?

GHH : IF. I. KNEW. THAT. I. WOULDN'T. BE. CALLING. YOU. [dramatic sigh]

Me : Then with all due respect, how do you expect me to find it for you?

GHH : It's in SW6, duh!

Me : That and about 200 others. [starts reading down the list]

GHH : Oh wait, I know it's open late!

Me : [opens each individual practice page] Sorry but I've looked through 20 results, they're all only open until six.

GHH : Yes, that's when it's open till, I told you!

Me : [wondering what's sharper - the edge of my lunchbox or the monitor stand] Guess what? That's what time nearly every practice in the country is open until. I can't help without a single, identifying factor!

GHH : Well if I get malaria and die, then on your head be it!

[click]

Please Darwin, if you're up there?


Part two on it's way soon. (ie. after I eat some crumpets and bask in the glory of having Sunday off work)

Posted by Sick Sad Minion at Sunday, December 10, 2006 | | Comments

Hiatus

I've been neglecting my embryonic blog of late. Such is my dissatisfaction with NHS Direct and the NHS as a whole that I didn't dare write, for fear of the dripping venom dissolving my laptop. Current government strategies for improving the NHS seem to be:

  • getting rid of senior/supervisory posts - after all, it's not very democratic to have to answer to anyone is it?
  • replacing qualified staff with whichever penniless student, desperado, or chancer happened to walk into the recruitment agency first
  • 'solving' the above by giving them so much training, for so long, that they can't cope on their own and leave after two weeks

New job titles are created so that no-one feels left out, in the last two years this has accelerated to the point where no three NHS workers have the same job title. If a patient calls we have no idea where to refer them. We can't say "We can't deal with this, it would be more appropriate to call your GP/District Nurse/Social Worker/CPN" No, that's too easy. Now they have a Community Mental Health Team, often a strictly 9-5 job, unreachable outside those hours. They have a Chronic Illness Management Nurse or liaise with an Expert Patient Panel.

This makes the whole system a joke. We have a new assessment system so that if a patient calls and it's blindingly obvious that they need to see their GP, then they'll be told to contact them (in hours) or we'll electronically refer them (out of hours) This makes the queue for nurse assessments much smaller, and saves people waiting hours to be told the blindingly obvious. However callers often tell me "Oh the secretary told me to call you, and that if I was ill I'd have to call at half eight tomorrow morning to see someone" My GP surgery works like this. You call at 8:30 am, receptionist takes your details, a nurse calls you back and telephone triages you, you go to the surgery and see the nurse practitioner, then you wait for two hours in the waiting room to see the next available doctor. So people don't bother, they use the OOH service instead, or call us, and both services end up like an old tart, stretched and abused.

Apologies. It just needed to be said. Back to ranting about the callers next, I promise!

PS - NHS Blog Doc is a must read for anyone else interested in the worrying state of the NHS, and interesting patient stories.

Posted by Sick Sad Minion at Sunday, December 10, 2006 | | Comments

Glow in the dark - an open letter to the Russians

Dear Russian operatives,

it is not often I recommend the American way of doing things, but next time you want to 'neutralise' someone who is irritating you, please use a gun. They're relatively easy to get hold of. I could pop down to my town centre and arrange to at least borrow one. Radioactive alpha particles might win you "Most Creative Assassination" award at this years Mobbo Awards, but won't someone pleaaaase think of the NHS?

Yours,

Sick, Sad Minion.


Oh it's been exciting at Tragedy Towers. There we were, sat taking calls at last after a telephony failure, when the little yellow Envelope of Doom appears at the bottom of our screens. Normally the EoD signifies something as dull as a message saying "BADGERDOC Out of Hours link not working, please advise patients to contact directly on Admin number" or "TENY site closed due to staff laziness so expect OOH calls from Scarborough on 0845 line". So I click EoD and see:

"URGENT! We have received word that BA have issued a press release to Sky News, further to the investigation surrounding Alexander Litvinenko. We have no further information at this time and the HPA (Health Protection Agency) have not issued specific guidelines for callhandling."

Oh well. It can't be that bad can it? I mean.. they'd have informed us in advance if it was going to be that bad, wouldn't they? I quickly nipped over to the BA website and read their press release advising anyone affected by the news to 'call NHS Direct on 08454647" I then clicked the link of affected flights, oh... only 220. I was beginning to regret my decision to schedule a late break that shift, there was no way I'd be getting one now, and hot, salty tears ran down my fat little face.

There wan't a supervisor in the place that didn't look like a plane had just landed on their gold-plated house. A colleague informed one of them that 220 flights had been affected, he choked back a cry and snapped "It's not official, the HPA haven't announced that!" No, he was right, if the HPA don't verify something then it isn't true. Ahem.

Countdown 3...2....1... "Good evening, thank you for calling NHS Direct. My name's Inappropriately Amused and I'm a Level 3 Operative, how can I help?"

Chaos ensued, tempers were lost, I began searching for Polonium on eBay.

Posted by Sick Sad Minion at Sunday, December 10, 2006 | | Comments