The Six Trigger Patients who can Hijack your Shift

There are certain patients who push your buttons and cause you to lose your cool. It’s up to you to anticipate these triggers and come up with a plan to manage their care with compassion and poise. GREG HENRY, MD Founder and CEO of Medical Practice Risk Assessment, Inc.; past president of ACEP. All my attempts to delve into the shallowness of epistemological relativism and to grasp objective and universal truths seem to have flopped. View-ing my fan mail versus hate mail, it is clear that the more down-to-earth suggestions are what people want. As one reader put it: “Don’t give me any crap by Bonhoeffer and Kant. Give me something that I can use in my next shift.” To that end, I’d like to give you some techniques for recognizing when you have been either emotionally or intellectually hijacked and you are no longer in control in your own emergency department. Believe me, patients can play you like a violin, whether you like it or not. Oh, you think it doesn’t happen to you. Yeah, right. The staff, the patients, even your own children are masters at twisting your emotions and responses. I tell people all the time to write down those incidences or activities which make them the maddest. Then whenever they see those things appear in the department, to be on their guard. You are set to be intellectually hijacked. You need to understand your own list of “hot buttons.” You need to know when you’re about to be captured, hauled off, sucked and blown out the other e...
Source: EPMonthly.com - Category: Emergency Medicine Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Source Type: news