It was a long busy day at the clinic. Let’s roll this back and start from the beginning. It was a Monday morning one foggy day. I arrived to work at 6:45 am and got myself situated. Shortly thereafter, I made some extra bold coffee with double vanilla creamer and logged into my office computer. I took a look at the schedule and then realized how busy the day was going to be. The first patient arrived at 7 am. The next several hours there was a patient every 15 minutes. In addition, several patients started calling in to be seen without an appointment and were added to the schedule to be worked in on the side. Lunchtime arrived late and I had about 20 minutes to find a snack. I had eaten quickly on my own.
That afternoon, it was non-stop cold and flu cases along with medication refills for chronic hypertension and diabetes. Phone calls started coming in about prior authorizations. Insurance companies started calling for medical necessity paperwork to fill out for patient insurance coverage. Shortly thereafter, patients were stacking in the waiting room and I started to skip my charting. Finally, 6 pm arrived and I finished seeing my last patient. Dreadfully, I looked at my inbox on the electronic medical record and saw a scrolling screen of unfinished charts. Everyone else was on their way home except for me. I had several charts to finish at this point. Finally, it was 7:30 pm and time to go home. Going better than expected, all charts were closed and finished.
Shortly thereafter, I started my drive home only to find myself at the nearest Culver’s ordering a double cheeseburger meal as the hunger pains were nearly unbearable. Eventually, I made it home at 8:45 pm with excitement to see my spouse and kids. I walked through the door only to find the kids were already in bed. The wife was watching television and it was on a commercial at the time. She says, “go get cleaned up and join me for some TV.” I was excited to get my mind off medicine and I took a quick shower. I put my pajamas on and walked down the stairs. I look at the TV and asked the wife, “what are you watching?” She replies, “Grey’s Anatomy.”
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