It's Gone!
excited freak out GIFGiphyYelling for his brother then whispering loudly to him "Check to see if I still have my penis... I think they took my penis!" then proceeded to flash the whole room.
Edit: for those asking the procedure was to remove a benign tumor in his cheek (face cheek not butt cheek).
Hey Sexy
Was recovering a patient after surgery who got ketamine which has a known side effect of making you super emotional. When she woke up she started cat calling me telling me how attractive I was. Then she got worked up because she was thirsty so I told her I could get her ice chips. As I am getting her ice chips she starts to go "I hate to see you leave but I love to see you go." As I disappear to get her some ice chips she starts crying real tears that she scared me off and how sorry she was.
"woke up"
I apparently can't handle my anesthesia.
The first time I "woke up" I asked the nurse if I was going to be able to "fight" by Monday. My wife properly translated that to "can he teach his wrestling class."
Before we went home, she wanted to drop off my prescriptions at CVS.
She left me locked in the running car. After she dropped off the prescription, she turned around to find me in the CVS standing in the frozen dairy section holding german chocolate ice cream. I told her I needed it "because my people made it".
Car was still running with the passenger door left open.
Its You!
its you beyonce GIFGiphy18-year-old girl "recognized" the (male) anesthesiologist from tinder last week and accused him multiple times of not showing up to their agreed date - while randomly falling half-asleep in between. As we put her back in bed she mumbled that she is not even mad, just generally disappointed in men and that she still thinks he's pretty.
Dry your tears....
When I "woke up" I was bawling my eyes out. When I actually came to, I asked why I was crying and everyone laughed at me and told me they had been asking me the same thing for almost an hour, which made me cry even more. We had to return a DVD and my mom stupidly asked me to remember before I went under so I wrote it on my arm.
On the car ride home, I reminded her every 30 seconds or so to take Sahara back and aren't you proud of me for remembering?! I also really wanted Jimmy John's and started crying again when my mom said there was no way I could eat it but that didn't make sense because I didn't need my wisdom teeth to eat. Good times.
Killer
In the early days of my surgical training, there was a day that I was assigned to a colonoscopy list. Standard practice is to pre-medicate patients in the anesthesia bay if required, particularly if they are a bit anxious about the procedure. I was clerking one of the patients in the anesthesia bay going through consent and the usual preop routine when I noticed that she was giving me these weird side-long glances and that her eyes would dart away everytime I tried to make eye contact with her. She was also extremely fidgety and was stammering a lot in her responses to my questions. I kind of shrugged it off as preoperative nervousness and let the anesthetist do his business.
Fast forward 10 minutes and I'm standing behind her; she, curled up into the fetal position with her butt hanging out and I, colonoscope in hand. As the propofol starts rushing through her veins, she turns right around, grips my forearm and stares up at me with a dreamy look on her face and goes: "You know what, Doc? I bet you kill it with the ladies."
A moment later she was asleep and I was checking her colon for polyps.
Fancy Dress
I just had a bowel resection and was hopped up on morphine. My divorced parents hadn't sat in a room that long together in forever. My sister uncomfortably quiet between them tells me my junk is hanging out of my hospital gown and I say,'if my balls are hanging out. That makes this a ball gown.' Really helped with the tension.
Ya Hear Private?
Independence Day Reaction GIF by Broad CityGiphyAnesthesiologist here. During recovery from general anesthesia, I called one of my patients by his full name in a loud voice. He opened his eyes suddenly jumped upright and sit on the bed and he said something : Sir, yes sir! He was under military service at that time.
Sorry Bud
Not a doctor, but I was told by my dentist that when he was prepping me to remove my wisdom teeth, I asked him why he became a dentist. I vaguely remember him telling me a story about how when he was a preteen he was at a local pool, running around when he slipped and smashed his chin on concrete and shattered some of his teeth (ouch). He was amazed at how well they reconstructed his teeth that he decided to go into dentistry.
Apparently, I then looked this man in the eyes and said, "Well that's a stupid freakin' reason to become a dentist."
Sorry, Dr. J 😬.
fart wtf GIFShe farted so long and loud the entire 20 bed unit heard her. Then she said "I was trying to clear my throat, excuse me. And I want a vanilla latte, I got a headache." As medical professionals, we had to hold in the laughter but that didn't stop patients from turning into hyenas.
Let me do it....
I'm a doctor and was getting a knee reconstruction, and asked one of my best friend's dad to do my anesthesia. He was head of department at the hospital I worked at at the time.
Apparently after he gave me the Midazolam (to chill time out and basically I forget everything from then on), he inserted a local anesthetic block into my leg.
The next day he told me what happened.
Apparently, I then told him it's not working and he should have done it higher up and over tried to grab the needle from him to show him, after I asked if he knew what he was doing. I also complained the bed was cold.
We still have a good laugh about it.
DAVID!
david rose what GIF by Schitt's CreekGiphyWoman woke up from surgery and said to her husband, "David! That alarm clock has a nose and it's running! Wipe it!"
"What time is it."
The very first time I was under I was in third grade and was relatively scared. What kept me brave was the promise of burger king breakfast afterwards. It was an early morning procedure that required fasting and I rarely got fast food. They ended up running behind that day so it was up in the air if I would wake up and get out in time to get my breakfast (which ended at 10).
The first words out of my mouth were "What time is it." When my mom informed me it was already about 9:30 I tried to get out of bed and nearly ripped out my IV in the process. When she tried to tell me that we would be late and I could get it another day I promptly burst into tears.
Edit: I did get my burger king a different day. Thank you all for your concern.
"What are you doing?!"
One of the times I had an endoscopy when I was around 10 years old I woke up pretty groggy and naturally with a dry and sore throat. I asked the nurse for water but she said I couldn't have any yet. She left the room so I started climbing over the raised sides of the bed to get some.
She walks back in with me almost at the point of no return (also the point immediately preceding the point of face planting the floor as I was in no state to be balancing or climbing), freaks out screaming "What are you doing?!" So I say something song the lines of 'getting some water' and she relents and goes and gets me some.
A Vegetable State
When I was a toddler, my mom fell off our roof and broke her back. Apparently she was terrified she was going to become a vegetable, because after her back surgery she asked the nurse, "Am I a broccoli, or a cauliflower?"
Ready Freddie
freddie mercury GIFGiphy65 year old woman who had a wrist surgery. She was anxious so they gave her a good whack of propofol (the milk of amnesia).
Mid surgery she was having the time of her life. In a thick northern Irish accent she was like "Did you just fill me up to me head with vodka?" "gimme a wee bit more boy, I'm loving this stuff."
Then she said the anesthetist looked like Freddie Mercury and started singing "don't stop me now". The anesthetist looked nothing like Freddie.
FLY!!!!
Not a medical professional, but my mom was coming out from under anesthesia after a procedure a few years ago and I was trying to help her. She puckered her lips so I picked up her water cup and asked if she wanted some. She turned her face toward me and said, "Do I LOOK like an AIRPLANE?!"
The nurses and I completely lost it. I still tease her about it sometimes.
Well if it was good for Hitler....
I'm a consultant anesthetist (UK) and there are LOADS. Often declarations of love from the patient as the drugs are kicking in.
My all time favorite is a 40 something guy a few years ago - he needed a testicle removing for cancer. He'd never had an anesthetic before and was super nervous, to the point of barely saying anything to anyone.
As the drugs started to kick in, we realized someone was quietly singing. It was the patient.
"Hitler... has only got one testicle..."
elmo GIFWhen we got to the hospital he went into the pediatric section of the ED and there were stickers on the wall of sesame Street characters. He started talking about this unicorn on the wall (there wasn't one) and how it was trying to be friends with Elmo but Elmo didn't want to be friends with him. His mum and I had a chuckle and I had to pry the whistle out of his hands.
Hopped
I dislocated my shoulder in a way that my arm ended up stuck up over my head. Apparently, while all hopped up on demarol, I was laughing hysterically while the doctor was standing on the table/gurney wrestling with my arm to get it back into the socket. I don't remember a thing.
Ummmm.... Ok.
Parks And Recreation Nbc GIF by HULUGiphyThis woman undergoing C-section under spinal anesthesia + ketamine said 'Show my baby first to my brother-in-law, he deserves to see her first'. I sometimes wonder what happened to her marriage after that.
Speaking in Tongues....
After having my tonsils out at 24, something got crossed in my brain and I started answering the nurses in Welsh. Since I was definitely English (with an obvious Midlands accent) and we weren't even near the Welsh border at the time there was a reasonable amount of confusion until it cleared up about 15 minutes later and I began speaking my native tongue again.
I also sleep talk in Welsh occasionally.
Spirit Delusions
Patient came into the ED as a trauma, got ketamine sedation for an emergency procedure: "I'm deaaaaaaaad" "No, you're ok, we're taking care of you" "I'm a ghoooooost. Whooooooo!" wavy arm motions Ok.
I was given Ketamine in the ED and was like comatose. I couldn't move and was having trippy hallucinations.
I felt like I was floating above myself and was thinking "oh I'm dead. Is this dead? This isn't so bad". I slowly came to and then like flipping a switch I full came back and immediately started sobbing uncontrollably about how as a vet tech I give ketamine to animals and how scary it must be since they don't understand they've been drugged.
Potato Fingers
starving french fries GIF by The BacheloretteGiphyAnesthesiologist told me that as I was going down that I was describing my fingers feeling like French fries, but French fries after you take them home and put them in microwave so they're soggy and not as good.
For Ron
The most memorable funny one was a guy who sat bolt upright, mime rolling a cigarette and tuck it behind his ear "saving it for 'ron" when I asked what he was doing.
Anesthesia can be a wild trip.
The kids will always scream when they wake up.
Not this Menu
A woman was absolutely distraught that she was going to be made to eat asparagus and was repeatedly telling us that she did not like asparagus, especially with eggs, and was politely rejecting the asparagus she thought we were constantly offering her.
To you and you and you....
pending schitts creek GIF by CBCGiphyNot anesthesia but delirium. Introduced the oncoming nurse to the patient. The patient gestured grandly around the room and said "(nurse's name), meet all my friends!!"
....to an empty room.
Delirium is so messed up.
I know somebody that was put into Residential Aged Care because of their advanced dementia, months into their stay it turns out they just had a UTI and once it was treated they regained all functions again.
When in Nam
My brother had top surgery and woke up from being put under. My step mom (whom I call "Mom") recorded him talking about how Abe Lincoln was a great guy. She asked him how he knew and he replied with: "I knew him back in 'Nam". And that's the story of how my brother fought side-by-side with Abe Lincoln back in Vietnam.
La Familia
My dad (Italian) was waking up from anesthesia and kept looking at his asian nurse and saying he was so glad his daughter was with him. And that he loved his daughter. The nurses were confused, so they went out into the waiting to check for his daughter. I was the only one in the waiting area, and when they saw me and started hysterically laughing. I am Korean by birth, but what adopted by my lovely Italian family. :)
All the Gold
I was the patient, but right before Christmas a couple of years ago I had my gallbladder removed. In the recovery room as I was waking up I became obsessed with singing the 12 Days of Christmas song. I kept asking the nurses what order the verses were in. As they were wheeling me out of the room I heard a nurse belt out "Five golden rings!" Which was followed by everyone's laughter.
Turn it Up!
dog salsa GIFGiphy"I'm preparing to salsa dance."
"Stand back everybody. There's nothing you can do to stop me."
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Redditor knightfall0 asked:
"Doctors of Reddit, what patient made you go 'How the f*** are you even alive'?"
Depression can kill.
I was on home call for ER in a small town, got a call from the ER nurse one night and she was like 'EMS brought someone in here and they think she might be dead?'" I was like....' ....well, IS she?!'" She was like 'I don't know.'"
....
"This was a seasoned RN, by the way, so I was like, well, guess we're treating this is a Code Blue kind of situation, so without any further information, I jump into my car and rush over to the hospital. Once I got there, I realized why the triage nurse was so confused. In the trauma bay, lay what appeared to be skeletonized remains under a blanket. The person felt warm to touch, so I opened their eye, and a yellow, wrinkled, shrunken eyeball stared at me and then suddenly MOVED. Potassium of 1, for those familiar with lab values."
"The backstory was extreme self-neglect/depression combined with caregiver neglect. Weighed in at 67 lbs at a height of about 5'5". We actually resuscitated her, very aggressively, and unbelievably, after about 8 litres of fluid, she started speaking a word or two at a time and recognized her daughter."
jochi1543
That's pretty metal.
"My father's doctor couldn't believe a) he didn't need to amputate his feet and b) he was still alive. Dad had 'brittle diabetes.' His pancreas would kick in & out due to a congenital deformity. At 82, he had significant heart issues, including angina enlarged heart & clogged arteries. One day, his feet went black. (Not just bluish, or grey; black as charcoal) rushed to emergency. We were told they would amputate, but 'to say our goodbyes.'"
"Dad refused surgery. Said he'd rather be dead, at his age. Hours later, his feet were pink. We took him home that morning. Doctor actually apologized for upsetting us, but said he'd never seen anything like it."
Mumofalltrades63
"Wow. The dude just straight up refused to die and his body was like, 'Alright, jeez, you win.'"
whompmywillow
GiphyWell that's good.
"I have a hospice patient that has been on our service for 4 years. I'm either really great at hospice, or really bad at it."
MeanMrMustard66
"My great grandma went to hospice because she was no longer ambulatory, needed help using the restroom, losing weight, etc. A month in her nurse comes in to find her in the restroom on her own steam. This was paired with a marked weight gain. Turns out the nursing home food was sh*t so she just wasn't eating enough, but the hospice facility let her have salty, buttery pierogi and kielbasa again, so she started eating."
ilovelefseandpierogi
Excuse me, what?
"Patient here. When I was two I was being treated for asthma due to wheezing, labored breathing, etc. One night it got exceptionally bad so my mom took me to the ER. They put me face down to do a CT scan (this was 1990) and when they were done, they turned me back over and I was blue, had stopped breathing."
"CT revealed a volleyball-size mass in my chest. Emergency surgery revealed what was supposed to be my twin. It kept growing inside my rib cage and finally had nowhere to go in my toddler body so it cutoff my airway. It had fingernails, hair, appendages... everything but major organs. I made a full recovery. I am a healthy 31 year old now. Zero asthma. Only remnant of that night is a scar that goes from the center of my chest to the center of my back."
"Update: Definitely didn't expect this to blow up. Damn. Thanks for my first gold! This was a tera toma, so it was never a viable human. Edited the post to show that I am the healthy 31 year old. lol Anybody that quoted Dwight Schrute is my hero."
JuracekPark34
What a brave pup.
"Veterinarian. Dog hit by a train. It severed the dog's leg and the dog carried its own leg home. Owner brought dog and leg to the ER. Edit: leg could not be re-attaches due to significant damage to limb. Dogs do great as tripods though."
Total_D*ck_Move
GiphyA miracle recovery.
"Currently in residency, but this was a patient I saw in medical school:"
"This one has more to do with a patient's past medical history instead of anything acute. Had one patient in one of my internal medicine rotations who was admitted for hip surgery who was one of the nicest sweetest people I've ever met. Her surgery was pretty routine and there were no complications."
"In her past medical history, she was diagnosed with stage IV endometrial cancer that had spread to her brain. Apparently she had undergone chemo, radiation, primary tumor resection, and surgery to remove the brain met. She remained cancer free since that period. The fact that she had undergone that whole ordeal and appeared to be mostly healthy and was in remission from her cancer really blew my mind."
PMME_ur_lovely_boobs
Wow.
"A couple pictures of me before and after brain surgeries were on the front page around this time last year. The mortality rate for acute subdural hematomas is 50-90%. Of those who live, approximately 20-30% regain any brain functioning. Due to the subdural hematoma, the bleeding in my skull was so severe that I also had cranial herniation. My brain tilted 5 millimeters, causing my brain stem to compress into my spinal cord."
"That I not only lived, but woke up, and recovered well enough to go back to work/get married/travel the world/return to baseline physically is a straight up medical miracle. I'm still in touch with the neurosurgeon who was on call at the hospital that day, and he says the same thing."
QuiGonGiveItToYa
Unsave him.
"A guy I took care of during my residency... f*cking cyborg. I was the chief on trauma. Got a page about a patient en route with a stab wound to the chest. When the patient rolled into the trauma bay, he had no pulse. He had been stabbed in his left upper chest (3cm below clavicle)."
"He got an ER thoracotomy (if you want to feel like a bada**, then do an ER thoracotomy!!); we were able to cross-clamp his aorta; we took him right to the OR. We oversewed one small artery below his rib, then transported him to the ICU still intubated. Eight hours later he was extubated and wanting breakfast. Seriously, dude?!! He was dead 10 hours before. He was also a complete a**hole. No wonder someone stabbed him..."
k_thx_bye_
Nurse turns to the doctor, 'Can we unsave this one?'"
Genghis_Chong
GiphyWhat the hell?
"Lady in her mid 30s was in the clinic for a 1 week follow up post foot amputation (diabetes), she was admitted straight from the clinic because her blood glucose was 600mg/dl (normal is 80-120) and the wound was severely infected. We used super concentrated doses of insulin to bring it back to the 200s. She was on strict diet restrictions and we couldn't figure out how it wouldn't drop any lower than 250."
"Turns out her kids (teens) had been sneaking giant 64oz sodas and candy bars into the hospital, literally one week after we chopped her foot off because of uncontrolled diabetes. Not exactly a case of "how the f*ck did you survive that trauma/disease" but 'how the f*ck do you even function on your own?'"
F00FlGHTER
Such a bummer that he had to leave the party.
"Belligerent guy comes in, in a wheel chair. He doesn't want to be here, he's f*cking fine, the party was good (EMS) f*cked his evening up. EMS brought him in from a bush party, the guy had a chainsaw stuck in his thigh and shin. Literally jammed in his leg. And severe burns after falling into the bon fire on half his body."
"Guy was hammered, didn't seemed bothered by the fact he was severely burned or had a chain saw in his leg. He ended up losing the leg below his knee, and got a nasty infection from the burn. But still. If his leg wasn't completely f*cked, I am convinced he'd have gotten up and tried to fight people."
MisterMetal
The Cockroach
"During residency, my ICU patient had to have his chest reopened less than an hour after 6 hour open heart CABG surgery. He needed 12 units of blood, his heart massaged then shocked 4 times. Cardiothoracic surgeon in the ICU operating because no time to go back down to OR. Was an illicit drug abuser and alcoholic. Nurses called him the 'cockroach.' I checked in on him for 4 weeks. He was unresponsive every day."
"On week 2 zero we had to consult ENT. To take maggots. Out of his nose. I was sure he was a goner after that. Week 3 passed, no change. Week 4, day 24 I believe, at 6 am, he opens his eyes. I was shocked. He has a permanent trach and ostomy now, but somehow is alive."
novelgraphics
In Half
"I had a patient who was literally cut in half at the pelvis after a car hit him and pinned him to a telephone pole. Paramedics carried his legs in separately. He was wide awake and talking to me as we quickly put in a central line and he got all the bleeders ligated by like 5 different surgeons."
"He declined pain meds repeatedly, what a legend. He was in the OR 5 minutes later. Luckily this was at a major academic center with an exceptional trauma surgery team. Apparently the guy lived, not sure what his quality of life was after, but pretty crazy."
spiderinside
The Fallen
"I work in trauma and once had a guy fall off a roof he said he remembered hitting the bars on the scaffolding on the way down. We originally thought he'd fractured his femur but nope just a small hematoma. He was in bed next to a man who had broken his ribs and had a small C spine fracture when he fell forward picking up his keys."
WeAreThe_MusicMakers
Bad Romance
"EMT here. Brought in a PT who's (now former) girlfriend stabbed him in the face with a Chef's knife. The knife went through his right eye, missed his cranial cavity, and stopped about a mm from his brain stem. The X-ray was nuts. We showed everyone."
Seannj222
music video mv GIF by Lady GagaGiphyBones to Dust
"As a med student on my emergency rotation I had a guy brought in who had fallen off a 7th or 8th floor balcony and landed on his head. Essentially DOA and we couldn’t get a blood pressure when he got to the hospital. As a student my job was to basically stand to the side and squeeze the bajillion bags of blood that went into this dude."
"His cervical spine was essentially dust on the initial CT scan we got. I figured he probably wouldn’t have made it but about a month later I’m now on my ICU rotation and I see this guy awake and conscious. Pretty crazy."
axtothemax
Dead Center
"Obligatory not a doctor, but my dad is and he liked to tell us about the crazy shit he saw, this post made me think of one of those in particular. Huge guy, linebacker build, came into the trauma ward with a gunshot wound dead center of the chest. He could breathe fine and he had a pulse. So they did a chest Xray and found that the bullet had spent all its energy getting through this guys sternum and was just resting on his pericardium."
leftenant_sebastian
Immortal
"My mom's a doctor. I asked her about this when it came up on reddit:"
"When my mom was in her ER cycle during internship, man with police officers behind him came in the ER. The man was perfectly fine and walking, so my mom and her colleagues were confused. The officers showed them a picture of a crumpled metal piece, which was a car. It didn't look like a car at all, just metal trash."
"The officers told my mom and her colleagues that they rescued the patient from the car, which was lit on fire only a few seconds after they rescued him. The patient didn't have a single scar on him, was perfectly fine, and got his name around the hospital for being 'immortal.'"
Goodbye Now
"My sister was the patient, but every doctor who's gone thru her whole file has had this reaction. When when was 9 she fell around 35ft off a bluff and landed head first on bedrock. Shattered every bone in her skull. A very well known neuro surgeon took a look at her when she was brought in, said 'sorry there is absolutely nothing I can do for her."
"I'd say she had a 10% chance of surviving the night, say your goodbyes now.' 3 weeks in a coma, three months in an ICU, 6 months as an in-patient, she's still alive today. She has permanent damage of course, but holy cow can kids bodies recover from a lot."
glahtiguy
He Still Walks
"My Dad is 87, He had prostate, liver, bowel, colon and skin cancer. For the skin cancer he had lots of reconstructive surgeries. (His whole tibia region and the back of his hands.) Every year he has to have at least one skin lesion removed. He had a couple of heart attacks and then a sextuple bypass surgery. He also had a big pneumonia, a huge abscess and a small stroke. His Doctor wants to see him every 6 months. I think just to be amazed that he's still walking around."
sonia72quebec
Dead
"Type 1 diabetic in their 20s presented dead of DKA (unresponsive, no pulse, in VF). Multiple rounds of CPR, defibrillated, eventually stabilised in ICU. Self discharged immediately after being extubated less than 48h later."
luminousbawd
Excited Gratitude GIF by Lil JonGiphyMedical professionals have definitely seen things.
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Never miss another big, odd, funny or heartbreaking moment again.
Well... they kind of are, but not really. You'll see what I mean.
So Reddit asked a pretty interesting question recently:
Doctors of reddit, have you ever encountered an anti vaxx patient? What happened?
And it turns out medical professionals dealing with anti-vax patients is pretty common. There were a few mentions of people who could not be vaccinated, but what we really found interesting is that there wasn't anywhere near as much "studied under anti-vaxx professor Jenny McCarthy" as we expected.
According to the doctors who responded, most of the anti-vax patients they meet are just scared and misinformed. It may take some time to gain their trust, but they typically come around and are open to whatever is safest once that trust is established.
Then there are the parents who think diseases are God's way of punishing a child for sins committed in a past life. Yeah... not much to be done for that one.
So Reddit asked a pretty interesting question recently:
Doctors of reddit, have you ever encountered an anti vaxx patient? What happened?
And it turns out medical professionals dealing with anti-vax patients is pretty common. There were a few mentions of people who could not be vaccinated, but what we really found interesting is that there wasn't anywhere near as much "studied under anti-vaxx professor Jenny McCarthy" as we expected.
According to the doctors who responded, most of the anti-vax patients they meet are just scared and misinformed. It may take some time to gain their trust, but they typically come around and are open to whatever is safest once that trust is established.
Then there are the parents who think diseases are God's way of punishing a child for sins committed in a past life. Yeah... not much to be done for that one.
Uninformed V True Anti-Vax
Many times. It often depends on the situation, if I have to do something to help the child that is unrelated to vaccines, I usually won't say much because I need to maintain a working relationship to help the child. It's also important to separate people who might be vaccine hesitant due to hearing or ready something, they are often willing to listen. True anti-vaxxers don't want to hear anything that contradicts them.
If I get an opportunity to talk to them more about vaccines I do so very carefully. Simply telling an anti-vaxxer the facts about vaccines doesn't work, so you have to move slow and ask them what their concerns are and try to answer them thoroughly.
99% of the time it doesn't work, so I fully document their refusal and then move on to the next patient. I just don't have time to sit and talk to someone for an hour about something they are ignorant about and are refusing to acknowledge.
The worst one recently was having to tell some parents that their 14 year old died from meningitis. They had declined the vaccine at school 3 months earlier.
Still Believes
Surprisingly the only time it was an issue was when I was a medical student, an Anti-vaxx mother refused the Vitamin K injection for her newborn due to anti vaxx propaganda.
Newborn had an intracerebral haemorrhage and is now a vegetable for life. Completely avoidable if the mother had accepted the Vit K injection.
Worst part for me was she didn't accept that it was preventable and still firmly believes she made the right call by refusing the Vit K.
Playing The Long Game
GiphyI've had several patients who didn't vaccinate any of their kids. While many practices turn these people away, I consider it an opportunity to respect their wishes and gain their trust, but on every visit I ask them to compare data and have an open conversation about what they know. I do this in as non-confrontational and as genuine and helpful a way as possible. I've converted a number of anti-vaxxers in this way, while turning them away likely would never have resulted in the same outcome.
Forging Records
My father is a pediatrician in California, where you can't send your child to school if they're not vaccinated.
During a physical, my father asked the mother of two children when the last time the children got vaccinated. She answers " I don't believe in vaccination. It causes autism." She then proceeded to ask him to forge the vaccination records.
Long story short, he presented the facts declaring her claim to be a myth, she cursed him out, and then he responds with "Ma'am, you're an idiot. Now get out of my office."
The family moved to Nevada so the children could go to school unvaccinated.
Ye Olde Photos
Keep the talk of whether or not the vaccines themselves are dangerous to a minimum; presenting facts to someone coming in with an argument based largely on emotion is a losing effort.
Instead, focus on the negative outcomes of actually contracting the diseases vaccines are designed to prevent (eg, immunosuppression, SSPE, ADEM, encephalitis, etc. with measles). Old pictures of little children suffering from the disease can put an exclamation point on the discussion, too, and help redirect parents' focus to the real source of potential harm for their children.
911 Dispatchers Share The Most Ridiculous Calls They've Ever Received | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
Invested But Misguided
As a pediatrician, this is my bread and butter. In all honesty, most of the anti-vaxx parents are that way because they have done some research and want to protect their kids.
Just because they don't have the training or inclination to separate real science from fake science isn't their fault.
It's my job as their pediatrician to make sure they know we both want the same thing, their child's health and safety. Once you develop a trusting relationship I've found a good 90+ percent of my anti-vaxxers will convert. I'd much rather have invested but misguided parents than parents that don't give a sh!t about their kids.
Told You So
GiphyYeah they happen
It's disappointing, but you ask a few questions, see what stage they're at (disinterested, defensive, paranoid, sheeple) give a bit of information and move on: If your mums group and 20 minutes of googling makes you that confident if your decision making so be it.
What does make me feel righteous is when I get to say "This happened because your kid was not vaccinated" and yes that might sound sad or evil but it's true, and deep down no matter what they say they know it's true - and the vast majority ensure their other kids are vaccinated.
- raftsa
Past Life Punishments
I did, but the scenario was so bad that I didn't have the mental energy to get angry at the parents.
Their 12 year old daughter presented with diphtheria, which doesn't exist anymore in my region thanks to a National Immunization Schedule. Their explanation for not vaccinating her was simple.
"Vaccines are drugs given to make people infertile to stop population explosion."
I couldn't explain to them in a way they would accept. I knew things were hopeless when they started saying God was punishing their child for doing something wrong in her previous life. Thankfully, the child could be saved - this time.
Disadvantaged
I'm a medical professional working in a very disadvantaged community. We deal with anti vaxxers constantly. In my workplace they are typically anti-vax for some religious reason or "just because."
I'm never happy about it but it only really upsets me when a parent denies vaccines for their child or when the IV drug users and addicts refuse them. It's like "Sir you inject crazy dangerous sht into yourself every day. What's a vaccine gonna do?"
Very In Depth
My brother is a doctor. He's told me and my family that when he encounters patients like these, he sits them down and goes very in-depth as to the possible dangers of remaining anti-vaxx or raising their children anti-vaxx. He says that in a fair amount of cases, this works very well and they decide to go ahead with vaccinations. A lot of the cases he sees that involve anti-vaxxers are people who are just scared and misinformed.
However, there are the occasional patients who absolutely believe they're right. Some of these are helpless, and he definitely feels exasperated by them, but he's got a job to do. As for some, the trick is done by naming and explaining many of the terrible diseases/consequences of remaining anti-vaxx, and sometimes there are success stories :)
I can only imagine how frustrating it would be, though. I definitely look up to him as I am seeking to enter the healthcare professions in the future as well.
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