So I am telling the nurses at my Ambulatory Surgery Center that because of the all the time it takes to do Electronic Medical Records (EMR) that I had to enter data at the lake when I go out there. Whereas I used to come out here and just mess around cutting grass and throwing sticks to Penelope, I now bring my laptop and log in to my office computer and EMR and try to catch up on charts. Think about it this way you will see how oppressive this is and going to be for the doctors that don’t do it but will have to in the future. I see 25-30 patients a day and it takes about 4-6 minutes to enter the stuff you did and learned during the visit. Well that is 150 minutes of EMR per day of seeing patients that I now do before work, spare moments during work and then after work and on weekends. It is a full time job staying caught up. I did them this morning after spin and have done them here at the lake this afternoon.
Anyway this past Thursday I am telling them that I now have a system where I have cleaned off a picnic table on the porch, found an oil lantern of Jessie Jewel’s I bought at an Estate sale years ago, have a “doing charts” playlist on Spotify and with an ice cold beer and being entertained by Penelope in the yard scooting sticks while I work…well it has made the drudgery of charting bearable.
I make the mistake of saying that I’d probably have a Miller 64. I mentioned this particular beer because I felt it would convey responsibility both in terms of calories and the lower ETOH content, but it had the exact opposite. The second I finished the last consonant of 64 the room erupted in laughter.
In unison all the nurses said, “ Miller 64? Are you kidding?”
“What’s wrong with Miller 64?” I asked.
“Is a girl going to be out there doing your charts?” one of them asked.
Another said, “It’s a girly beer Dr. McHugh. You might as well have a flavored Zema or a Mike’s Hard Lemonade out there. That’s embarrassing. You should have a man’s beer like a Bud, Heineken, or a dark Modelo.”
The laughter just continued. Oh they thought it was just way too funny. Snorting too funny laughter.
Prostate cancer, Dangerfield, and me…we just don’t get no respect.
Medical insight, personal stories and humor from a urologist who has been where you are now.
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