Home Editor's Picks 21 Tips for Patients on How to Be Good Patients: From Health Care Professionals

21 Tips for Patients on How to Be Good Patients: From Health Care Professionals

Doktor Schnabel
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94
"I see your point, saying I have 10/10 pain while texting was probably inappropriate"

Ok, it is time to be brutally honest to our patients.  As health care professionals, we want to take amazing care of them.  We want them to heal.  We want them to feel better.  But sometimes the greatest barrier to taking care of our patients, are in fact the patients themselves.

A few rotten apples have led so many medical providers to unfortunately become jaded. With these tips, we can hopefully stop the vicious cycle of jaded professionals and ultimately provide better health care.

hospital patient
“I see your point, saying I have 10/10 pain while texting was probably inappropriate”

Alas, here are 21 tips for patients when receiving medical care.  Let’s get the word out, save some lives, and make our days/nights better!

  • Do not check into the emergency department with fast food or a soda can in hand, especially if you have a intestinal complaint.
  • Refrain from cussing out your nurse, doctor, PA, NP, receptionist, or anyone else trying to help you.
  • Never state your pain is 10/10 while texting on your phone.
  • Check your panniculi (fat rolls) for food or foreign objects before coming to the hospital. Try to clean them out.  There is nothing more embarrassing than us finding a fried chicken leg in a deep fold.
  • Do not push the call light for help or for a turkey sandwich immediately after your nurse has left.
  • Do not think your nurse is your personal waiter or waitress at a restaurant or an employee at the Hilton.
  • Please keep your arm or wrist straight if your IV is positional, unless you enjoy listening to Michael Bolton.
  • Surprising as it may seem, remember that there are actually other, probably way sicker patients than you in a hospital.  Have some patience.
  • Stop saying “I have a really high pain tolerance.”  You are here in pain, so NO you likely don’t.
  • Don’t blame nurses or other staff for being too busy.  Blame hospital administrators for continuing to raise the patient to staff ratio.
  • Don’t cherry pick your Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) status.  Either make it DNR or a Full Code.
  • Please stop pretending to have a seizure in the emergency department.  WE ALL know when you are faking.
  • A simple “Thank you” or “I appreciate it” goes a long way when talking to your care givers.
  • Try to refrain from spitting or throwing feces at your health care providers.
  • Nausea or constipation symptoms are not allergic reactions.
  • “Heart races” is not an allergic reaction to epinephrine.
  • Spider bite to your AC?  Really.  Please stop using this excuse and come up with something better to hide your drug abuse.  Many hospitals are now just dispensing Dilaudid if you ask for it.
  • Never, ever, start a sentence with “Dr. Oz says.”
  • If you can’t remember what medications you take, write them down so we don’t have to rely on our extremely accurate (thick sarcasm) computer EHR systems to “just look them up.”
  • If you have a pacemaker or ICD, keep a goddamn card in your wallet or purse with the manufacturer info.  Seriously, you have a AARP card and a Cracker Barrel gift card in there, but nothing on your pacemaker?
  • If you don’t have real contraindications to vaccinations, VACCINATE!  Why are we even having this discussion in the year 2018?!

94 COMMENTS

  9. actually it’s crohns with severe anemia and left over pain from a broken c5. my point is your joke is now public record. it’s available to nurse recruiters and worse your patients.

  20. I was upset when I read the title of this article… But the content itself is good. Still, I don’t like the idea of labeling patients as “good vs. bad” patients. Nursing and other healthcare professions require a certain level of inference and tolerance, plus lots of education. This would be an awesome article for me if it didn’t suggest we label our patients in this way.

  21. I was upset when I read the title of this article… But the content itself is good. Still, I don’t like the idea of labeling patients as “good vs. bad” patients. Nursing and other healthcare professions require a certain level of inference and tolerance, plus lots of education. This would be an awesome article for me if it didn’t suggest we label our patients in this way.

  22. I was upset when I read the title of this article… But the content itself is good. Still, I don’t like the idea of labeling patients as “good vs. bad” patients. Nursing and other healthcare professions require a certain level of inference and tolerance, plus lots of education. This would be an awesome article for me if it didn’t suggest we label our patients in this way.

  25. I think one of the best parts is the intro:

    “A few rotten apples have led so many medical providers to become jaded and to have given up on humanity. Through patient education, we can stop the vicious cycle of jaded professionals and ultimately provide better health care.”

    So true. Unfortunately, those bad apples are not the ones reading this, or if they do read it, they are the ones who get up in arms pissed off.

  26. You come to the ER because you just threw up the bean burrito you just bought from the taco truck on East 39th. Don’t you know that’s why God invented toilets? Vomiting ONE time is not an emergency!

  33. Oh dear god take it from someone who knows…DO NOT PISS OFF THE FIBRO COMMUNITY. People whose chronic pain effects their whole bodies with the exception of their forearms, wrists and hands should not be messed with. They can smear your name faster than any community on earth.

  51. I remember when I was a unit clerk people would do this dragging their drag their IV pole down the hall (when they were very intentionally put far away from the station given their frequent flier status) to complain about it

  56. @ 1st glance I agree with you. but no, you’re a fool. I spent years with off and on 10 out of 10 pain, with a high pain tolerance (I can self-hypnotize and have proven so to neurologists), I texted my wife to give an ER status bc we both HAVE to work to pay bills. As a healthcare professional, educator, and patient…all I can say is GROW UP. patients are individuals. experience is based upon the individual.

  63. How is the “needle” that different ? I don’t have tattoos….but stabbing is stabbing…..I figure. I’ve had shots, blood draws, injections…..doesn’t the tattoo needle stab ALOT, just shorter stabs and many of ’em ???? That, is why we’re confused……

  83. Please don’t flirt with me or insinuate that I want to “check out your fine ass” when I come in to give you an IM injection to treat your STD for the third time in 6 months!!!

  86. I agree with you Melissa. I’m covered in tattoos but I cry like a baby at the mere sight of a needle. I can’t help it. The feeling of a tattoo and a shot are two totally different feelings and sensations.

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