And covers it welll!
My favorite of these? No reason to continue banning cell phones in hospitals.
4 thoughts on “Medpage Today covers ACEP meeting”
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And covers it welll!
My favorite of these? No reason to continue banning cell phones in hospitals.
Comments are closed.
I hate to say its a convienence issue, but I thik that’s why most ED’s still ban them. I know the research has been out there that digital phones don’t disrupt telemetry or interfere with other electronics like the analog “bricks” used to. Heck, in our hospital, the charge nurses, and house supervisors all carry hospital cell phones, and the entire hospital is wired with a communication system (voicera) that opperates off WiFi…
But nothing drives a doc nuts like having to wait for your patient to finish their phone call to finish the H&P…
Disappearing John took the words right out of my keyboard.
BTW, ACEP’s dues are horrendous and worse than the AMA’s dues. Not only do you have to pay ACEP dues but you also have to pay your state chapter’s dues as well. What a freakin’ rip off. AAEM baby!!!
I think the answer is to be honest, be direct about cellphones.
Not BANNING them, not saying they’re DANGEROUS (when they’re not).
They are RUDE. It’s a manners, a courtesy issue.
“Studies” that I have read about the risk of cellphones typically go out of their way to do everything they can to produce interference — I remember reading an article when they had to put a cellphone directly up against a bedside ventilator to create ANY problem (and not anything interfering with the operation of the equipment), after which the conclusion was that cellphones were dangerous next to ventilators.
I think we just need to train people. When people come in, or when you walk into the room, you say, “Do you have a cellphone with you?” If they say “Yes”, you say, “Please turn it off.” If they refuse, you leave the room or you say, “Well, I’m sorry, you can’t be in here with your wife/mother/sister/whatever. It would be best for you to be in the waiting area for that emergency call you’re expecting.”
+1 to greg, soar, and john
To be fair, the number of times I have had a H&P interrupted by an impromptu jay-z or godsmack clip emanating from a purse or pocket has been fairly low.
However, the REALLY annoying cell phone situations are when you are not at your most patient, for whatever reason, and you have to confront the realization that-not only does the person before you not have the slightest insight into how the ED is not their personal care after-hours clinic-but that, also,they have zero respect for the very valuable time that you have to give them and their not-even-close-to-an-emergency-by-the-densest-of-layperson-standards, as evidenced by their undeniable need to either a) answer the phone while you are trying to define what exactly “a little” or “a while” truly mean in reproducible values, or b) finish telling the person on the other end of the line what they would like them to bring from McDonald’s while you stand there patiently waiting to inquire about their “abdominal pain and diarrhea.”