Letter to the Urgent Care Doctor

Nwlywed07

Dear Dr. Anderson,

I understand that you are a grouchy, old man who is really ready to call it a day. However, I do not appreciate the lack of bedside manner you showed my son and I today. Lecturing me on my (lack of) knowledge of "correct medical terminology" while you are examining my sick child is unacceptable. When you ask an advocate to describe the symptoms, they are going to use terms that are familiar to the rest of the non medical population. Sorry I forgot my medical terminology dictionary at home, I must have made your job very hard having to decipher my "alien language" when I used the words irritable and lethargic. Telling me that my child looks to happy to be sick and that I'm over reacting is also not acceptable when you listen to my child's wet sounding cough and you just told me that his lungs sound wet as well or when you order a chest x-ray because you think he might have pneumonia. I also do not think it is acceptable for you to read the x-rays and tell me that they look questionable but because my child is content while I was holding him that there is nothing wrong and that it's just a cold. I'm very glad that you can reassure me that you will be the doctor on call tomorrow if I need to bring my son back in. However, I promise you that I will go to another medical facility before I let you touch my son again. I also would like to inform you that your boss will be receiving a letter from my family describing the despicable, unacceptable care that you provide to us today. Thank you for letting me spend my evening listening to my son continuing to hack up his lungs through the walls of his bedroom because you were too much of an ass to actually provide decent care for him today. Hope you enjoyed your evening.

Sincerely, 

One pissed off Mama Bear

alyss0nl

I hate going to Urgent Care. I've been once, only because my work made me when one of my students bit me. It was horrible. I vow to only go to my PCP.  I'm sorry you had a rough experience, and I hope your LO feels better soon!

jb2rn

holy crap! So he didn't understand your decription of your sick baby because it was in lay persons terms? Idiot.

Is your son ok?

valerieanne9015

I'm sorry you had to deal with that on tp of a sick LO!!  It's doc's like that that give all doctors a bad name.  Hopefully, you will get better help somewhere else if you still need it!

gina2433

Tell me you're sending this to him! Poor baby I hope he feels better. 

ArcadianDreams

If you described your son's symptoms and he gave you the correct medical terms, he was probably just trying to help you out so you would know for the future. Lethargic has a specific meaning in medicine and maybe that wasn't what best described how he was acting.

I'm sorry your little guy isn't feeling well. Hope he is back to normal soon! 

scoobyd266

Jerk! I hate urgent care! Hope your little guy is feeling better soon

 

[Deleted User]

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purpleXdandelion

I'm sorry you had such a bad UC experience. I work as a Lab Tech on the Urgent Care shift, and the majority of the Docs are great. It's awful how one rude Dr can make them all look bad. I hope you got the answers you needed for your LOs condition, if not I highly suggest going to your PCP who knows your history and LO better.

 

Nwlywed07

Update: The Radiologist called and said that whatever he has has just barely begun to settle into his lungs so at this point their is nothing to do but wait and see if he can fight it off on his own. We will reassess next week based on how he is feeling and his symptoms. And we will actually follow up with his normal Pedi. The only reason we even went to urgent care instead of waiting was because he we having such a hard time catching his breath in between coughing spells and was crying continuously. I didn't want to wait until the next day for him to be seen.

I know all urgent care doctors are not like that. I've had several good ones for myself and DH. There is just something about when it's your sweet baby that nonsense like that really rubs me the wrong way. 

And yes, I am actually drafting a letter to be sent to their HR department. There is no excuse for the way we were treated. I think the saying goes something like "for every one written letter an HR person receives...20 other people have thought the same thing but didn't notify the management...or something like that. 

Thanks for all the words of encouragement and support ladies!