Where should we treat the unvaxxed?

Interesting that you have no counter-argument to Centerfields reply.

Pretend it didn't happen and soldier on?

 

Yeah but when they come in with a burnt anus from trying bleach enemas - hooo boy! Then it gets tempting - especially when they are STILL trying to tell you the vaccines will kill everyone

But none of us would be that unprofessional - and believe me! There are patients out there who are real GOMERS (GET OUT OF MY EMERGENCY ROOM). Those are the ones kicking up a stink about not being seen by a senior medical officer within 5 minutes of arrival only for the medico to find the problem is that the child has nits (No lady - no nurse is available to pick the nits out of your child’s hair - that is YOUR job!) But we take a breath, count to ten, think “calm blue ocean” and maintain the kind and reasonable even if the patient is gobbing spit at the staff and screaming that the coffee is cold

it is not uncommon to resort to “dark humour” as a coping mechanism.

I wouldn’t show any prejudice against an unvaccinated patient but the idiotic twerps who deliberately spread misinformation (Tucker Carlson et al) or worse the (expletive deleted) members of the “patriot front” who have been waging a misinformation campaign to target OUR First Nation people - well they are a different story - I would still get them better but that would only be so I could kick their arses so hard their bum cheeks would wrap around their heads!

 

~ A better question :

Where should we bury those who died after being vaccinated with this " experimental therapeutic " ... ?

 

It is important to bear in mind that these sad souls are victims of a mental/emotional disorder that deprives them of the capacity for rational thought and renders impervious to empirical data.

They exhibit multiple symptoms of cognitive dissonance and render themselves singularly unsympathetic by lashing out incoherently, and often viciously, when presented with inescapable facts that conflict with their adamantine ideological dogma.

 

Segregation, it's the democrat way.

 

That's what he does. Any time I debunk his anti-vaxxer BS he looks the other way, and keeps repeating the BS, sometimes in other threads. His answers when he does answer are often evasive.

Soldier on is right, because this anti-vaxxer who spreads blatant misinformation (like the chickenpox girl picture) clearly has an agenda.

 

Don't put words in my mouth.

 

Honestly, do you have any idea how much money it costs through at least TEN YEARS just to become a physician in the United States? And does anybody who has worked away merely for four years just to get some kind of Bachelor's Degree want to work for crap-income?

Part of the reason that it looks like doctors are so wealthy is because of what they have to charge for services -- knowing full well that they'll have to write-off a large chunk of it, and, that insurance companies will force them to jump through hoops and write-down a lot of what charges are made anyway.

I've heard it asked, "Would you trust your life to someone who drives a sh*ttier car than you have...?" Think about it....

 

I am more on Republican side but I am strongly against medical cartel. Yes, sure as for any cartel (mafia) the cost of entry is pretty high.

 

So you get treated by a doctor who has only a HS GED?

 

Come on, man. There is nothing I can do against that system. Americans love extraordinary expensive health care, they love to lose their retirement savings to let their doctors to buy third/fourth/fifth house.

 

~ More psyco-babble gleamed from network "news " regurgitation ...

 

Clearly, fact-based reality is upsetting for you.

if you have paranormal insights that negate the need for reportage, you can pleasure yourself with your with them. I have no doubt they fit your ideological agenda to a t.

 

This is just another reminder that the OP is a partisan Democrat. Let it forever be known that the OP praised Biden after the senile clown authorized the bombing of children. The OP was simply waiting for the opportunity to praise Biden, as those opportunities are few and far between.

 

It’s too bad people don’t harbor such distaste for misinformation and disinformation from public health entities in the US. If there was as much distaste for that misinformation we’d be in a much better place. Unfortunately the SOP seems to be disliked for misinformation coming from ignorant people, but approval of mis/disinformation coming from the educated/informed who know better.

It’s a very odd phenomenon.

 

Very well said, and I mean it both in content and form - your sophisticated use of the language demonstrates superior education and talent. But please, don't impact such a serious (although correct) view into my largely humoristic thread. Again, it wouldn't cross my mind to be any less professional and any less helpful to the unvaxxed who seek my care, in my real-life activity as a doctor. This, on the other hand, is the Internet, where from time to time I allow myself to vent some frustrations. This is not my real life hospital.

I've treated the most disgusting patients (such as sex offenders and pedophiles) with the same professional goal of curing (when possible) or mitigating (when cure is not possible) their conditions, regardless of the fact that they are the scum of the Earth.

During this pandemic, especially during the months when I volunteered to help in our Covid-19 unit, I've seen the most unpleasant anti-vaxxers spouting the most offensive ideas and lashing out at the very people trying to help them, once their ignorance got them in trouble with the virus, which some, even while seriously ill, kept thinking was a hoax. I never issued the smallest unpleasant word to them (although deep inside, sure, I was thinking, what an idiot), and always presented a compassionate look, and of course never did anything less for them in terms of the full use of my medical skills and the medications and machinery we had available to try to save them, as compared to what I did for the vaxxed ones who had serious breakthrough infections (usually, the immunocompromised) that also resulted in hospitalization (they are a smaller percentage but they do exist, and in growing numbers after the vaccines faded in efficacy and Delta came up).

So, relax, mate. The very opening phrase in my OP did establish that I wouldn't deny care to the unvaxxed... but yes, we do get internally frustrated, and having this venue to vent a little actually helps, when it's time to go back to work.

 

While we've agreed almost every time here on PF, making of you one of my favorite posters here (and you know it), and while like you I lament the misinformation coming from health officials, I still think that the misinformation coming from anti-vaxxers is worse and more abundant; better proof, they are kind of winning this battle, given that we (the United States) have one of the lowest rates of vaccination among rich countries. Now we're worse than some Third World countries too. For example, Brazil has recently passed us in percentage of fully vaccinated people. That's a low dirty shame for the US. While some of the vaccine hesitancy comes precisely from blunders committed intentionally or unintentionally by public health officials, I firmly believe that the bulk of it comes from the intentional misinformation campaigns by the other side.

 

"unvaxxed" sounds stupid to me.

 

I assume from your answer that someone I have on Ignore is ranting about how rich we doctors are, and likely, how we make money from faking the diagnosis of Covid-19 in death certificates (if the latter wasn't claimed in this thread, it's been claimed in many other threads).

So, about the "fake" Covid-19 death certificates, laughable. Billing doesn't go by death certificates. When the patient dies, billing stops. Billing relates to procedures, medications, materials, and physician time while the patient is alive and being treated. And yes, the Covid-19 diagnosis was granted a surplus, but it still applies even when the patient dies with Covid of something else, rather than of Covid, because the surplus is intended to compensate the hospital not only for the involved care a patient with severe Covid-19 necessitates, but also for the expenses a hospital incurs in isolating a non-serious Covid-19 positive patient who is being treated for something else, including PPE equipment, protocols, additional staffing, etc. A death certificate mentioning as cause of death Covid-19 versus some other cause of death with co-morbid Covid-19 has no bearing on this, and its consequence is not a billing one, but rather, a statistical/reporting one. For billing, merely a positive PCR for Covid-19 suffices. So the claim that we fake death certificates to make more money is utterly ridiculous.

Now, if the claim the ignored poster is making is that we doctors are overpaid greedy bastards, yes, we are high earners, no doubt, especially as compared to the general population (but not as compared to the 1%). While technically, especially given that we're a 2-income couple (my wife is also a medical doctor) and also counting on assets I inherited from my late father who was a rather wealthy lawyer, I am indeed in the top 2% of Americans, both in income and in net worth. Still, the difference between me and the true one-percenters is huge, several fold. Often, business owners and entrepreneurs who are not as highly educated, make more money than I do, not to forget many lawyers and financial investment people.

Now, let's think of it. Would a lot of people go into Medicine, a truly grueling profession, if it weren't well compensated? Doubtful. We spend 12 years of our premium youth time (4 years of pre-med college, 4 years of medical school, 4 years - in some specialties, more - of residency training) studying and working like crazy, nights and weekends, with our states of being restricted to being with pre-on-call anxiety, on-call high stress, and post-on-call exhaustion (which then turns into pre-on-call anxiety the next day) while our friends are out having a good time, drinking and befriending whatever object of sexual attraction they favor... We get to the hospital during internship and residency training at 5:30 or 6 AM for pre-rounds... and leave at 11 PM when we finally finish up with all the paperwork and tasks.

All that, while accumulating at least $250,000 in student debt, if we are not independently rich when we enter medical school, or do not get a full ride scholarship - not to talk about college student debt (which other people have too, so I'm just talking about medical school for this, but often we enter medical school already with active debt, and add to it during medical school). Some of us take years to pay it all back, especially given that it takes a while to develop a lucrative practice or to climb the hierarchy of hospital-based care, while overhead costs, malpractice insurance, billing hurdles take a toll in the take-home income.

While I think enrollment in Medical School would drop if Medicine weren't a well-compensated profession, I doubt that most of my colleagues are greedy bastards. I think that most of us are actually compassionate individuals who want to help their patients. Vocation for Medicine is still more prevalent among good people than among greedy jerks. Do the latter exist? Absolutely. In my years of medical school and decades of professional activity, I've encountered my share of those. All professions have bad apples. But I am firmly convinced that most doctors are good people who want to do well and help their patients.

Just think of it.

Who is more likely to be a compassionate individual since childhood?

The one whose vocation is to cure or mitigate illness, pain, and human suffering?

Or the one whose vocation is to become a Wall Street financial type who profits from moving money around or a lawyer who sues people for a living?

Not that being in the financial field or the field of Law is automatically reserved to greedy bastards and not that they are all like this. I'm just asking, statistically speaking, in terms of higher likelihood. I'd believe that it is probably a fact that there are more people with sociopathic traits among financiers, lawyers, and CEOs than among medical doctors, not implying by this that many financiers, lawyers, and CEOs are not good people. Hm... maybe not CEOs. I think that to be a CEO, the skills required include being cynical and cold and willing to screw other people, or else the business won't thrive as much and the shareholders won't be happy.

But sure, there are lawyers who are public defenders, there are people who are financial advisers who are ethical and do try to provide to clients good investments instead of just milking them out of their money... There are good and bad people in all professions.

But I do firmly believe that the percentage of good people is higher in the medical profession, given the fact that a basic feature of the vocation is a desire to help others who are suffering.

 

You are right, but like I said, this is (or was) largely a humoristic thread. I do also prefer non-vaccinated, and professionally in real life I never say unvaxxed.

 

~ It's a label to serve a purpose - " us against then " psychology .

 

Yep! Going with “would rather have that person who is more focussed on service to others than Fred to self

 

Sooooo. What do you suggest we call people who voluntarily do not protect themselves during a pandemic - Darwin Award entrants?

 

~ Free thinking adults with common sense.

 

---who ignore science and facts.