witnessing a scene wherein an RN and a resident are literally yelling at each other is not good. all mouths were open as C, an RN, and Dr. P, a resident shouted at each other like they thought everybody else in the unit was deaf, or blind, or just didn’t care.

to be honest, i don’t think i really cared, i was just a little embarassed. i mean, it was a hospital unit after all, and there were patients. and there were family members visiting the patients. i wanted to disappear, but i couldn’t. so we all stood there, looked the other way, and wished it would be over soon.

one of C’s patient was refusing a very important procedure. the reason the patient refused was not because she didn’t care about the result of the MRI, it was because she was not in the right state of mind to think things over. she believed she is the current president of the united states, and that every yellow pill was created by the demons to kill her. besides, whatever it was that was bothering her will get better once she takes  a white colored muscle relaxant. plagued with an ethical dilemma, of the procedure that needed to be done as soon as possible, to prevent harm to the patient,  and a mentally unstable, refusing patient, C asked the opinion of our acting nurse manager, who told her to call the nursing supervisor, who told her to call the patient’s attending.

after paging the attending, C’s fiance called. he was on the ground, has excruciating pain on his back, and was unable to get up. panicked, C put her fiance on hold, called 911, and sent the ambulance to their place. i was standing behind C when she got back on the phone with her fiance, (a surgeon) who despite my inability to hear, obviously found the idea of an ambulance on the way, to be ridiculous. C argued about at least having the paramedics check his vitals, and after a few repeats of saying she will NOT cancel the 911 call, said she will now hang up.

this was when she got the phone call from the attending, who wanted to talk to the resident because really, what is going on here? the resident took the phone, and apologized to the attending endlessly, because “i know you should have not been called, but i had no idea about this issue, and i was never told until now”. of course, with escalating emphasis on the “sorry”, and “i was never told”, that made it clear she was both trying to save her behind from trouble, and at the same time trying to indirectly express her frustration that she was placed in a very awkward situation, by C, the RN.

C was furious, took the phone and told the attending that she was told by the supervisor to call her. when C was done talking to the attending, Dr. P reiterated  that she should have been called first, instead of the attending. to which, C, replied: “MY FIANCE IS ON THE GROUND, I DON’T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO HIM, YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND ANYTHING!”

P was furious she was yelled at, then the beat went on. i will spare you the details of the ugly exchange. just take my word for it when i say that it was not pretty.

an RN who was trying to save the night explained to Dr. P that it is not really her. that C was upset about  the situation that her fiance is awaiting an ambulance. Dr. P said she understood that, “but if she is unable to deal with things at work right now, because she has personal problems, why didn’t she just go home?”

the whole soap opera episode ended with C crying in the hallway, talking at a relatively loud voice to the outgoing and incoming charge nurses, about how Dr. P did not understand anything. at the other end of the hallway, Dr. P was talking to the other nurses, in a relatively loud voice about how wrong C was, in every account.

let me get the record straight by saying that i believe every person is entitled to react to any stressor in his own unique way. i believe C has the right to panic and get upset, and Dr. P has every right to get upset too. to be stressed out is normal, but is it too much to ask that medical professionals remain professional even at the most stressful of times?

when i try to analyze what happened, i don’t really know what the yelling accomplished. all i know is that most, if not all of the people who witnessed it felt sort of embarassed to be a part of the team. while the exchange of angry voices was going on, everybody pretended not to care, but for the next 11 hours, the discussion was unending.

i was glad that my patients pretended they didn’t care, because if they did ask me what the commotion and the shouting was all about, it would have been easy for me to lie and just say ” i don’t know”.

well, what do you expect me to do? let my patients understand that that’s just the way we are in our unit? that we don’t really mean to be rude and loud, but it just happens when things get out of hand? then what? explain to my patients that professionalism is really overrated, and that by all means, we all should just start yelling when we feel that  things are getting a little out of control?

i don’t know. maybe i’m just too indifferent to care, or too selfish to understand. it’s just that, just like everybody else, i didn’t really believe the elevated voice volume served a purpose.