Error. Does not compute.

I was a healthcare professional at one time, a nuclear medicine technologist to be exact. In the 6 years I did that job I made two serious mistakes.

The first was during my training and I was doing a tagged RBC study. I grabbed the wrong cold kit and reconstituted Hepatolite rather than PYP and injected it into the patient. I was able to make up the correct kit and give it and then the Tc99m as it should be and the test went fine. But I was very shaken mentally that I could have made that mistake. There was no radiation involved and the test went totally fine, so really this was a "no harm, no foul" kind of event. No one would have known except I admitted my mistake immediately to my supervisor. Live and learn.

The second was a classic mix up of patient names, patient rooms and exams. Two little old ladies in adjoining rooms, both getting two different nuc's studies over three different names. Operating on auto pilot I went to give a MDP injection for a bone scan and mixed the two patients up. How could I have done that? Well, for one the patients had switched rooms over night in the middle of their studies!! Mrs X was in the middle of her heart study and I can't remember what Mrs Y was having done that took a couple days in Nucs but they switched rooms over night and I just went up and injected the little old lady in room 123 thinking it was the same little old lady as yesterday. Well, I was so confident I was checking her name band as I was starting the injection. Guess what? About 10mCi into the injection I realize I've got the wrong lady. SSSSCCCCCRRRREEEECHING halt to that injection. So I come down stairs and do some quick calculations to see how much radiation I have given her and it comes out less than the amount required for a reportable event. But I had given it to the wrong patient, which is a reportable event.

I went to talk with my co-worker about what we should do. After getting chewed out for making that kind of flippant mistake we decided that since that patient was getting a nuc med study anyway and I didn't give them a full dose we were just going to let it go. No reporting, no paperwork, nothing official. Let my guilt do all the work in punishing me. And having a coworker whose trust I had to earn again.

So in 6 years and thousands of procedures I made two mistakes. Well in the past 3 months I have been on the receiving end of two mistakes from my health plan!!
(an actual picture from a visit to my HMO)
I went to refill a perscription and the pharmacist asked me, "Do you want drug Z? I see that you have an order for it you haven't filled." In this case drug Z happened to be a mild pain reliever so I said sure thing, give it to me. Well when I checked the label at home it was a prescription from a doctor I had never seen. Someone else's prescription had become mine. But what if it wasn't something as benign as it was? What if it was something that would have been dangerous for me to take? Or a narcotic pain killer? What if the person wasn't an ex health professional like myself who knew what the drug was in the first place?

I trusted that the pharmacy was giving my something I really had been ordered to take. They trusted me I would say yes to something that I knew I was supposed to be getting. They failed at first and I failed when I got home and realized it wasn't something for me. But hey, I now have prescription strength Naproxen.

And today in the mail I received a letter I will type out for you:

4/26/2010

Re: Rowdy M Xxxxxx
XXXXXXXXXXXXX St
San Diego, CA 9XXXX

Your health is important to us. Our records indicate that you were placed on a wait list for an appointment in Obstetrics and Gynecology Department. We are making attempts to contact you by mail and phone to schedule your appointment.

Blah Blah Blah it goes on from there. So not only did I never ask for an appointment in OB/GYN I am a GUY!! Hello?!?!?!? Now they are asking me to go to an appointment for something I never asked for but can't even physically qualify for! Yet when I hurt myself and need a twisted joint or broken bone looked at it is almost impossible to get an appointment.

Hopefully you are like me and you find this more exasperatingly funny rather than scary. Ok, I've made my own mistakes but I made two in 6 years. But to be the recipient of two in two months?

My lesson for you, dear readers? Be smart and be in charge of your own health care. You never know when they will want you up in stirrups when it really isn't your turn.