Another Failure of Communication

 “My son with pain in ear. Maybe he need a doctor.”

“I can come to the hotel.”

“Not today. I give medicine. Maybe if he has pain tomorrow.”

“So you’ll call me tomorrow?”

“Yes. Can you come in the morning?”

“Yes.”

 “When.”

 “I can be there between 10 and 1.”  Strictly speaking, I can come at any time, but I like to avoid driving during the rush hour.

 “Three hours is too long. We want to visit the city.”

 “You said you’d call tomorrow. When you call, I’ll tell you exactly when I’ll be there.”

 “OK.”

Most guests who promise to call never call, so I put the matter out of my mind. After noon the following day, the phone rang. It was the concierge at that hotel. “I’m afraid we’ve had a complaint, Doctor Oppenheim,” she said. “Mr. Desai in 403 says he and his family have been waiting over three hours. Are you going to come?....”

 

 

Converting Two Visits Into No Visits

A man at the Bonaventure was suffering an earache. The pain was not severe and had been present several days, but he wanted it checked. This seemed like an easy visit.

But it was 5:00 on Friday. My traffic app showed a solid red line for the ten mile freeway drive downtown, converting a half-hour trip into… I hated to contemplate it. I explained that I could be at his room between 8 and 9. That was fine with him.

I had barely hung up when the phone rang again. A guest at the Warner Center Hilton had diarrhea. The Hilton is fifteen miles in the opposite direction from the Bonaventure with an equally red freeway. I could have scheduled it for later, but if a third call arrived….

The guest was not terribly ill, so I pointed out that most diarrhea is self-limited. I gave dietary advice and recommended an over-the-counter remedy that was a good as the one I hand out (actually the same), and suggested we talk again in a day. Happy to get free medical advice, he agreed.

At 6:30 the Bonaventure operator called to inform me that the guest wanted to cancel the visit. When I phoned both guests the next day, they were doing fine.

More Easy Visits

“A bee stung my wife. That was two days ago, but today it’s more swollen.”

I explained that bee stings usually get worse for 48 hours before they improve.

“We catch a plane tomorrow, so we’d like to see a doctor.”

Before I left, the phone rang again. A man’s ears had become plugged when his plane descended the previous day. He worried about an infection. I explained that pressure changes while flying don’t cause infections, and the discomfort often persists for a day or two. I suggested a decongestant, but he wanted someone to look in his ears.

A visit from the hotel doctor is not cheap, and I’m liberal with phone advice. Only about half my calls turn into a visit. Now and then I have the delightful experience of making a housecall because the guest wants one despite my assurance that it’s not necessary. In this blog, I’ve recounted occasions where what seemed like a no-brainer turned out to be no such thing. That rarely happens, and it didn’t happen this time.

The bee sting turned out to be a bee sting, and the guest’s ears looked normal. Sometimes hotel doctoring is a snap.

A Delightful Bonus

The patient was a Brazilian two-year old who may or may not have had ear pain. Infants love everyone, and older toddlers are usually frightened enough to hold still, but from one to three years of age, children who don’t like doctors are uncontrollable. Taking a temperature in the armpit required the parents to hold her down. I dreaded the ear exam.

There was a knock on the door, and an elderly gentleman entered. This was the child’s grandfather, I learned as we shook hands, and he was a pediatrician. Immediately I held out my otoscope which he accepted with thanks. 

The entire family piled on; the child screamed and fought as the grandfather looked in her ears and forced open her mouth to examine her throat. He spoke little English but made it clear that nothing abnormal had turned up. He delivered an elaborate explanation to the family in Portuguese. I handed over a bottle of Tylenol, and everyone was happy.