My favorite triage note from today:"10 year old female accompanied by her mother. Mother brought her daughter in because she has been having large bowel movements. Patients mother states her daughter is only having one BM per day and it is formed, but she is worried about the size of her stool. "
-ER Doc
22 comments:
mmm ... is there a grading system for stool sizes?
So what was the discharge diagnosis?
I hate peds ED.
Oh yeah, now THAT'S an emergency...
OMG. I worked in a pediatric surgeon's office years back. Parents brought in their son for the exact same complaint. Dad comes rushing out of the room and guides me to the bathroom and SHOWED ME his son's latest prize. I was the receptionist. People are just weird.
I have a nephew who had this amazing ability to produce the longest and the thickest stool humanly possible. To this date we call him "Timber". He is now 36 and hates the nickname.
Julie- Yes there is. The Bristol Stool Scale:
http://www.globalhealingcenter.com/bristol-stool-scale.html
If you don't need to hold on to a sidebar on the wall, it's not big enough! LOL Seriously, everybody seems to be obsessed with their stool...10 is too young to be teaching your kid to worry about it.
Enjoy your day.
I just told her it was fine. discharge diagnosis was normal physical exam
OMG, I actually feel bad for the little girl. I can't even imagine how embarassing that would be. And, why is mom inspecting the poop of a 10 year old? I'm pretty sure, by that age, I had been using the big girl potty on my own for some time.
Anyone not afflicted with this malady simply can't appreciate the problems and embarassment this unfortunate condition causes. I'm in my 70's and have had it all my life. Clogged toilets are the major issue, along with anal fissures and piles, in addition to the pain. One must keep some kind of tool on hand to cut the stool into pieces that will not stop up the plumbing. Travel presents special problems- shall one carry a tool, made of wood or plastic, or try to fashion one from available material on the trip.
Please don't minimize the concern of the patient, or make fun of them, especially the young.
Gotta love parents like these. They get so nervous and bring their kid to the MD for every little thing. Somebody has to warn these folks that seeing doctors is dangerous when you have non-dangerous problems.
They'll keep up the visits till the kiddo gets X-rayed enough to cause a radioactive tumor or gets some horrible drug reaction. This of course, will confirm the parents worst fear: there really was something wrong with little princess all this time and now they finally have proof! It's a vicious cycle that ends up with kiddo dead and parents suing every doc in sight.
Once had a parent bring in kiddo because he was sighing. No dyspnea, no wheeze, no cough--just sighing!
Parent: Don't you think he needs a chest X-ray!?!
Then it was my turn to sigh.
To Anon that have problem with clogged toilet, I hear you, saw it with my own eyes, and broke up Timber's pooposaurus myself. It is a problem alright but it certainly does not deserve an ER visit.
So if I scored a 2 on the Bristol scale this morning should I go to the ER for emergency intestinal detox?
;-) j/k
DocV
the sad thing is i can see some people in my mans family worried like that...
"Timber," LOL.
More water? More fiber?
ROFLMAO!
Now I know where we get all the bowel-obsessed patients...the seed is planted in childhood. Oy!
thank you Doctor D for bringing out the truth that some doctors take advantage over people sometimes..hehe
The ignorant parents are just genuinely concerned for what they might think is abnormal for their child. Parents come with many such complains, for which they should just be reassured that everything is normal, rather than make fun of them.
My kid is not worried, she brags about em when they are the size of a redwood and wants us to come look at her latest creation. We decline and tell her it ain't normal to brag about such things. She informs this is not normal poop and worthy of attention.She will NEVER be treated an ER visit so she can brag to strangers.
Julie, I think what you're talking about is the Bristol Stool Chart. I remembered my young nephew who clogged our toilet after unloading a huge and a seemingly hard one. We immediately went to the doctor to check if he is okay, but in the case of clogged toilet, we called the plumber. Minnesota, being a big city, had no problems on finding one from the directory.
After knowing that my cousin was alright, we bought a heavy-duty toilet, so it can handle the flushing of the big poop with the knowledge given to us about the proper way of flushing by the plumber (Minneapolis-based).
Post a Comment