Friday, September 12, 2008

Dealing with people


My job involves dealing with people. I've been doing it for over 22 years. It's not a job anyone can do and it's very demanding. Over time, I have developed skills that allow me to provide the best possible service to the public. This involves the ability to listen to what people are trying to tell you. Sometimes you need to be a bit of a mind reader. One of the biggest challenges is to understand the crux of the matter they are trying to convey when the majority of people are not articulate,they can be either verbose or incomprehensible or incapable of speaking English. Lets face it, some people are just dumb. That is the challenge.
When it came to my turn to be at the receiving end of such attention, when I became the customer/patient the horror of the situation that exists was a complete shock. Here I was being ignored, dismissed, treated like a moron and worst of all, nobody was listening to what I was saying.

Allowing for the fact that most people can be morons when needing help, it doesn't mean that everybody is a moron.

At the emergency ward of the public hospital, the triage nurse asks me if I want to see a doctor.Any other response to "yes" is completely ignored. We must follow the protocol or hit a brick wall. So, I try to explain to the triage nurse the nature of my wife's condition and why she needs medical attention and I'm asked "what is her date of birth?" Nothing else matters.
Now, if the nurse was a clerk, I could understand the importance of the question but a triage nurse is there to assess the patient. This nurse didn't give a damn about the condition of the patient. When I asked the nurse why the condition of the patient wasn't important, I did not get an answer. When I requested to see the Neurologist, I was confronted with a different nurse who began with the same question, "do you want to see a doctor?" No, I'm being attended to I replied. Wrong answer it seemed. And so on and so on and so on.

So I went to the welfare agency to find out if there's any support or home help available. My wife is in a terrible state. I mentioned this.
I was given a brochure with a phone number to call for counselling for myself. That's not what I was asking for.

No wonder these organizations need to employ security guards to protect the staff. The staff are complete morons who hate dealing with the public. So what are these people doing in jobs that require dealing with the public if they lack the necessary communication skills?

Next time I'll be prepared. I'll hold a banner saying "please listen to what I'm telling you"


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2 comments:

Jeannie said...

I'm so sorry you are having so much difficulty. I think it is common enough. I would go through the phonebook and look up community services, health services or whatever to see if there is an organization that provides caregivers to help in your case. Or if you know anyone who has received help in the past, ask them how they got it. I know it's not your cup of tea, but you could also call up the minister of probably any church and ask if they know of where you can get help because they will definitely be plugged in and should be able to help you out in some way. Or ask the chaplain at the hospital. I hope someone listens.

Unknown said...

Sorry to hear yet another story of man's inhumanity to man. I hope you can find some good support Lex.

John

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