I remember a time were I wasn’t scared to be a health care professional.
When I helped people because helping people was the right thing to do. I wasn’t concerned that trying to help people may lead to problems or difficulties that could stop me doing the thing I like to do. I remember a time when I wasn’t terrified that I hadn’t “followed procedure”.
I was relaxing at home on Friday night after coaching my son’s football team and a friend of mine contacted me who said there child was in difficulty. They were in difficulty with an orthodontic appliance were the arch wire had moved and was sticking into there gum. They were in pain. The parents were unable to sort this (they are not patients at my practice) but I agreed to see their child at 9:30 on a Friday night to help because it’s the right thing to do when a child is in pain. I fixed the problem easily. Why is it though that I do that with an air of trepidation, that I haven’t done the notes correctly, the medical history correctly, logged everything correct or consented them correctly in writing for the procedure that was carried out. Why cant I just do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do. This will not come back to bite me because I didn’t do anything that would come back to be a problem, but why is it that I still have a tiny nagging sense that things like this, when I do them, are not seen as correct now and you can be heavily criticised if something happens.
This fear has eroded concept of the health care profession beyond all recognition. But much more in dentistry that any other aspect of health care as far as I can see. I wrote this in my office after I had seen the individual in question at 9:30-9:45 on a Friday night. It was the first time in my life that I realised that being professional in health care actually frightened me.
Blog Post Number - 1291