Anonymous Doctor

Which is the fake ER patient?

1. Woman comes in saying she tried to commit suicide, took 25 sleeping pills, mixed it with alcohol. She seems normal and alert. Blood alcohol comes back negative. She says she actually thinks she only took 10 pills, and no alcohol. Still no evidence she actually took anything. We tell her to rest for a bit and we'll check on her later. She screams as we walk away. "Aren't you going to give me something to help me sleep?"

2. Young guy comes in with a friend, drunk, says they're from a local college. ID badge says he's 25, so I ask if he's a grad student, says no, he's an undergrad. Looks young too. We let him sober up, seems like he's fine so we're doing the discharge paperwork, and his friend says wait, that's not his name on the paper. So I'm thinking uh oh, someone screwed up the ID badge and got him mixed up with someone else. Nope-- the same fake ID he used to get the alcohol, he used in the hospital. So he got admitted under a fake ID, is really an 18-year-old freshman. The nurse tried to get hospital police to scare him but they said that if we got them involved they would have to actually arrest him and didn't want to bother. So the nurse just pretended she was some kind of hospital administrator and gave him a stern talking-to (and took away the fake ID). I'm just glad the friend was stupid enough to screw it up for him, because otherwise we've got records under a fake name, no way to bill the patient, etc. What a mess.

3. Obese woman comes in with a varicose vein that literally burst. She is dripping blood from her leg, it's coming out in spurts. And she also has a bunch of bedsore-like ulcers all over her leg-- basically big sore holes. I nearly passed out, this was seriously disgusting. I've never seen anything like this before, but the attending said it's not that uncommon. Still disgusting.

4. Elderly woman comes in, quietly pulls me aside. "I'm itchy." I step back. "I keep seeing bugs on me." Scabies. I begged the attending to give her to the other resident. He liked me, so he did. I do not want scabies. I do not do not do not want scabies.

Give up?

So do I. They're all real, and they're all from one night. Along with a dozen of their compadres. Welcome to the emergency room.