Anonymous Doctor

"What's that smell?" asked the nurse.

"I don't know."

And we scanned our wing of the ER for a few minutes before determining that, yes, our drunk 21-year-old had gone to the bathroom in his pants.

Again.

We gave him three new pairs of scrub pants, over the course of four hours.

He kept soiling himself.

He kept apologizing for it.

And then he kept doing it again.

How much did he drink? We don't know.

Is this the first time he was drunk? Maybe.

It was the first time he'd been to our ER.

***

"I need you to remove my hemorrhoid," said the 50-year-old postal worker.

"Sir, we don't do that in the ER. You need to make an appointment with the clinic, or with an outpatient specialist. It's not an emergency, and it's not something we can spend the time doing here."

"Doctor, I've been to three different ERs this past week trying to get someone to take care of this, and every time I've been turned away."

"Yes, exactly. That's not something anyone's going to do for you in the ER. You're wasting your time. You need to make a clinic appointment."

"I'm not coming back again. I've already wasted three days on this--"

"Yes, you're wasting your own time. You will have to come back again, but not to the ER. You need to go to the clinic."

"But I'm here now."

"And I can't help you now."

"Then I'll wait."

"Sir, this isn't a problem we are going to take care of in the emergency room. You should leave, call the clinic tomorrow, make an appointment, and then come in when they tell you to come in."

"No. You're going to do this now."

"Sir, I'm not."

"Then I'll wait."

"I don't want to have to call security."

"Does security know how to remove my hemorrhoid?"

"I can certainly ask them to try."