Henceforth I wish be known as Danger Man. I am also considering submitting a claim for Hazard pay. Strangely this has nothing to do with our practice being engaged under the new(ish) "Violent Patient Scheme" to take on the care of an individual who was known to visit their former practice "tooled up", as I understand the vernacular would have it. No indeed. Under this scheme we are in fact far safer since we will only be seeing this individual under controlled circumstances in a secure room in A&E and with a security presence.
No, my problem is far more prosaic. It all revolves around the luchtime home visits. I've never really considered these a particularly risky part of the job before. There have been a couple of occasions when on a call out to the Chavvier end of town I have warily gripped stethosocpe and script pad a little tighter, but most of the local hard types know full well that I know their mums so that's generally ok. It's the getting to and fro that is now exercising my mind.
In the past two days I have seen five cases of "Whiplash Injury". No not that kind.... the sudden acceleration / deceleration of the neck that goes with a car crash. Since these five people are all unrelated and each involved in a separate RTA on Saturday last that means I know of at least five accidents that day. The local GP community numbers around 23 Docs, so if my experience is not exceptional (and I have no reason to believe otherwise) that makes for around 100 RTA related injuries in and around Ambrige last Saturday. Now granted Saturday was a busier day than average with everyone trying to get the lagers from Tescos before the match, but I suspect it was no more than twice as busy as usual, so 50 injuries might be more representative of a "normal " Saturday.
So hold on a minute, that's maybe twenty five actual accidents. On a Saturday. We all know all the really annoying drivers come out on a Sunday, so logically the accident rate is not likely to be less. Weekdays more people at work during the day so perhaps the daily rate will fall by as much as 50% to say 12 per day. So that's 50 accidents at weekends, another 60 the rest of the week and at least two victims per accident, for a weekly toll of around 200 injuries. Plainly not all are severe, and many may not make it in to surgery or A&E at all making this a conservative estimate to say the least.
And yet, knowing all this, as they must, the PCT expects me to venture into the maelstrom five days a week to tend to the needy.
Lucky I did that Tank Driving course a year or so back. Now then, just how much would a Warrior set me back.....
5 comments:
Just as well the heatwave is over for now, I suppose, it is one of the many weather conditions that brings out the carelessness in drivers.
Not drivers like you and me, of course, the rest of them.
Ooh, your word verification had a z in it. Excellent letter.
z-- I was working on the theory they are all being distracted by the flappy flags that are sprouting with such profusion here. There are days when I feel positively unpatriotic, no flappy flag, no red shirt, no white shirt, no spudlike face with sticky out ears... er belay that last one...
Still I'm afraid football leaves me baffled. Just not tribal I guess.
Glad you liked teh word verification. To me they all look like names of tiny villages in Wales or Poland. I mean where else would you find Eqndgoy?
wendz-- have a glass of rose on me.
*There are parts of the web where that would entail me now being drenched in glasses of same, but you'er not like that are you, I can tell ;-)*
Wales is more like the Ar*e End of the Universe if you ask me, but they sure can spell funny.
A propos of nothing we had a new automated check in system put in to the practice this week. There are buttons to allow you to select from about a dozen laguages, apparently including Suomi and Welsh, but none of the ones commonly used round here.
Plandii could be in Romania.
Today's post is brought to you by the letters k l w and j.
Curiosity brought me here. I didn't know doctors still do house calls. We have to phone the surgery - very nearly impossible - to make an appointment for the doctor to phone us back to make an appointment to visit the surgery. Not that I ever require or want house calls (touch wood) but occasionally need the odd thing looked at.
wendz-- Actually an old usenet (possibly now Google-) group called alt.callahans (I know technically not the web.... ) but a place full of nutters who -mostly- got there through reading the works of Spider Robinson. Too long a tale for this reply, but bascially a bunch of loonies who enjoy puns, booze and all round silliness.
Pi-- yes we still visit. Though after yesterday's surgery I'm beginning to rethink the whole thing. Surprisingly few functioning tanks available in my price range, and nowhere to park one anyway...
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