And The Hits Just Kept On Coming

“I’ve been getting killed here man. I have seven admissions waiting for you already” and his face did that awful contortion we do when we tell someone they have cancer or something.

I really felt for him. It’s not bad enough that the Medical Admitting Resident (MAR) is a powerless job, a triage secretary of sorts, but all he ever gets to do is give bad news to Residents and Interns who end up bitching at him and he ends up bitching about the Emergency Physicians (EP). It’s a sort of insult pyramid we pay strict adhesion to, we bitch about him (MAR), MARs bitch about the EP, EP’s bitch about Everyone Else.

Well, I admitted ten patients overnight, myself. The other nightfloat added another ten and various other Residents added fifteen more. All together, a really busy f--king night. There was a lot of insulting, bitching, yelling, laughing, and general downright putting down but it all added up to the Medical Madhouse Record of total patients admitted overnight.

When Cardiology COMMISH came in the morning he nearly peed when he found out how many patients we had to “discuss”. We had him “EKG’d-out” by the tenth patient and all “Chest-X-Raid fatigued” by the fifteenth, all "damn the CT" by the twentieth and all "Screw Neuro" by the twenty first.

And the hits just kept on coming. Two hours later, morning intake rounds turned into morning intake weekend conference and a look of admiration came upon the other Residents in the room as they had realized that we had accomplished the previously unaccomplished. Not only did we set The Record, but we had the Commish back in his chair, grasping for air, and…all E.K.G’d out!