You can always tell the engineers.
The things patients bring in
Dialysis report card
One of my 81 year old patients just recently started on dialysis. I took care of her CKD for about 3 years before she needed to start dialysis. Today, we had a care meeting and she told me that she was doing great on dialysis and her labs verified this.
Her pastor reads all the good report cards that the kids in her church bring to him. So she brought in her dialysis report card and her pastor read it on Sunday.
Sometimes the simplest things…
I just had a great patient encounter.
An 83 y.o. African American gentleman was referred to me for a creatinine of 1.7 mg/dL (eGFR 50 mL/min). On the initial visit he had a positive review of systems for obstruction. I added a PSA to my normal laboratory work-up of CKD and it ended up grossly positive at 42. We referred him on to urology and they diagnosed prostate Ca. He is currently getting hormone therapy.
Today he came in for his first visit with me since the cancer diagnosis. He was so appreciative. He hugged me. He acted like I saved his life. There was a strange asymmetry to the experience, I felt that I had done almost nothing more than a routine diagnosis while he was treating me like William Osler.
Sometimes the simplest things. . .