Posted on 03/18/2016 7:06:58 PM PDT by originalbuckeye
Yes, scarey.
I found out when I had to go to an ER late one night and the doc was from India. Besides smelling like curry and being rude to me and the staff, he was incompetent.
I asked my father (a DDS and MD) about this guy, how could this guy work in the US as a doc when he was simply a smelly guy with ZERO people skills and questionable diagnostic training (I had severe tonsillitis and he didn’t ever look in my throat and declared I was drunk. I don’t drink).
My father told me about the certifying exam and nothing else was required. Come to think of it, this was in the mid-80’s so maybe things have changed since then. . . .I hope.
D*** that’s fancy.
To be fair, the Indian doctors the UK has had have been a credit.
The emergency number in the UK is 999.
Wrong again, wanna go for the hat-trick?.
Or just one bad doctor.
To be fair, not in my experiences:
We disagree, and here is a short few reasons why.
At RAF Bentwaters, late 80’s. Weekend. Wife drops in pain, can’t hardly breath and is in agony. Base hospital closed. Ambulance takes her to Ipswich hospital. In waiting room for at least half an hour before anyone would respond to our calls for help, too include the ambulance crew searching for assistance. (NHS. . .wonderful). Finally, a crew takes the wife to an examination space in the ER and leave immediately before I can say much. No ‘we will be right back.” Nothing. They just left.
After about 10-min or so, I went in search of help and found a paki doctor sitting in the tea room, relaxing. I insisted he come take a look, wife in extreme pain. He said he would in a few minutes (on his break, after all). I did not move and became loud. He got up and reluctantly followed me to the wife.
He poked around, asking her questions (she was not coherent, in extreme pain). I answered the questions but yet he never looked at me, didn’t acknowledge my answers and kept asking my wife questions. I raised my voice again and told him that within the last two-years she had cancer in that area and perhaps it came back. He looked at me and started to ask her questions again, not asking about cancer.
I became unglued and even the Sister’s started to interrupt the paki doctor, insisting he listen to me. He sneered, yes SNEERED at them and barked at me to be quiet, that he was the doctor and I was not so be quiet.
He summoned a couple of doctors (interns) and they quietly conferred and then the paki doc said; “Right then, that is what we will do,” and then he told the Sisters to move my wife to a Ward. He turned to leave, never talking to me, never explaining what was going on. I asked the paki doctor what was going on and he replied: “It okay. Everything okay. No worry. Go home” (yes, word for word that is what he said—an event like this gives you total recall).
I said it was not okay, that he needs to explain to me what was going on, what they were planning to do. He said everything will be okay and I have no need to know what he was planning on doing because he was a doctor and I was not. (Basically telling me to shut-up and not challenge him).
I AGAIN asked what he was going to do, and what about the previous cancer? He turned and just walked away. He never once mentioned the cancer to the interns, never acknowledged the medical history of cancer my wife had, as well as cancer in her family.
I went to the Ward with my wife and the Sisters were the best. They cared, they listened and they were compassionate. They told me they would ensure the next doctor coming on duty in about an hour would know all about her medical history and asked me to go and take care of our young son, left with friends at the base—he was terrified as he watched his mother collapse in pain and being taken away in an ambulance.
I did leave at that point. The doctor that came on duty, non-Asian, a true British doctor, he was wonderful, called me and explained in detail the examinations they were going to do, and any possible treatment plans, too.
Another incident:
I was having a liver biopsy in 2006. Went to the appointment and found a female Korean nurse waiting for me. Nice, friendly. The nurse had the tray ready with the local anesthetic and a HUGE needle that will be used to take a couple of core samples. The Asian doc showed up and he had the nurse swab the area where he was going to jab me with a local anesthetic. He picked up a smaller needle, stuck into an unopened local anesthetic bottle and drew the solution into the needle and started to approach me to stab the anesthetic into where the big needle was going to be used. The nurse stopped him, mentioning that he was about to use a full concentration of anesthetic and a concentration and dose like that would likely kill me. Whoa.
The Asian doc started to argue with the nurse and she kept insisting he was wrong and he insisted he was right until she left saying she was going to get another doctor then he started to say “Not my fault. Her fault, all her fault. Not my fault!” And he left the room. The nurse returned and the other doc was outside talking with the Asian doc. The Asian doc insisted he was not at fault, that is was all her fault.
Add the above to my earlier incident with my tonsils and you can appreciate why I will never will see an Asian doc, ever, never. In my three specific (and only) experience with Asian docs, they have no first world inter-personal skills and they let their third-world/muslime attitude affect their supposed “medical” judgment.
Just my experience.
Betchya next time he doesn’t complain.
So it goes in merry old England.
1-—UK ambulance crews are there to deliver initial first aid skills, their job once at hospital IS to drop off the patient, pass on needed information, and then go back on call. Its then the nurses and doctors job. So they did nothing but their job, sorry.
2—No offence, but shouting at people and getting aggressive is usually counterproductive. I understand you, I have been in that situation with family members. But esp in polite old Britain and the NHS, they probably tuned you out as an obnoxious Yank. Sorry.
3—Paki is a racist term in the UK. Just advising.
4—I am very sorry you had a bad experience some years ago in the UK. I am glad though you did find the care overall good (the sisters and native doctor). He sounds like a bad doctor, white, brown or lime green. I think you simply met a bad UK doctor. I would never suggest all our doctors are great. Like any field, some are better than others and some much less pleasant human beings.
I assume the 2006 incidents were US?.
5—I would point out that the majority of UK Asian doctors are actually Sikh or Hindu. Both are highly regarded in the UK. As communities and as doctors and nurses. Sikh/Hindu and black doctors and nurses have been in the NHS since the mid 50s.
Other non white non UK doctors will be of black African (from British Commonwealth countries) or black Caribbean (again Commonwealth). Or of course from Hong Kong or palces like Singapore. They all have a good to vg rep in the UK.
As for Muslim doctors, I have dealt with a few and I have to say they were perfectly fine. One I saw for an minor eye problem was superb.
UK doctors of Asian origin will either be proper ‘UK Asian’ ie British born from Sikh/Hindu/Muslim families long here since the 1950s or will be from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, former countries of the Empire and/or members of the British Commonwealth. And will have undertaken UK training over and above their own native study.
True British?. Well, I have met curt and less than stellar ‘native’ UK doctors and nurses. The one bad nurse I had was Eastern European. So I base my opinion on individuals, not on their religion and race.
1-—The procedure for the NHS emergencies (unless its seriously life threatening where you get taken straight through) is to report on arrival to the reception staff, who will take your details and immediately pass it on the nursing staff. You are told to sit in the waiting rooms.
(Did you do that?. Did you know to do that?. The reception area is always right there at any A&E as you go through the doors. Usually to the right.)
How long will depend on when. Yours was at the weekend. Always sadly busier due to general accidents and alcohol based incidents. Usually if not busy, its usually fairly quick to be seen by a nurse who will evaluate the patient and get you a bed in the A&E dept. So a doctor can look at you.
2—Feel free to sneer (?) at the ‘wonderful’ (sarc?) NHS, but those who are not UK citizens do not pay for any NHS care, small or life saving, its UK taxpayers like me who foot the bill.
The NHS isn’t remotely perfect, but its there.
Nothing wrong with curry.
In the UK, its the beloved national dish!.
Thank you for your comments.
I reply:
“1-—UK ambulance crews are there to deliver initial first aid skills, their job once at hospital IS to drop off the patient, pass on needed information, and then go back on call. Its then the nurses and doctors job. So they did nothing but their job, sorry.”
Not the problem. Apology if I wasn’t clear, they did their job, more than their job, it was the hospital crew that eventually was located by the ambulance crew and it was the hospital ER people that took her to an ER space and then left without talking to me, didn’t care, walked off.
“2—No offence, but shouting at people and getting aggressive is usually counterproductive. I understand you, I have been in that situation with family members. But esp in polite old Britain and the NHS, they probably tuned you out as an obnoxious Yank. Sorry.”
A doc ignoring a patient in painful duress and trying to mitigating the guilt of such unprofessional (in)action because the person was an “obnoxius Yank” is the height of arrogance and crulety, refusing to act just to punish? Hearltess.
Regardless, your point #2, generally agree but sometimes one has to raise their voice (not yell, I never yell) to get attention, convey a sense of urgency. . .especially when you have a patient in painful duress and the doc is drinking tea and being dismissive.
If you are a doctor and ignoring a patient that is truly suffering and then act in a counter-productive manner because someone raised their voice to convey a sense of urgency, you have no place in medicine. Besides, it got the doc moving. Oh, final note on the “polite’/”obnoxious” call, the Brits are so well practiced, being “polite” and insulting at the same time is an art form, and if you want to truly set the standard on what is obnoxious, look at Brits or Germans on holiday. Yikes. The “ugly American” is outdated and so far from reality that it is a laughable charge. Having traveled extensively internationally for decades, I base that observation on experience, too.
“3—Paki is a racist term in the UK. Just advising.”
Interesting, “Yank,” short for “Yankee,” and “Brit,” short for “British,” but those aren’t insulting/racist terms but “paki,” short for “pakistani” is? Interesting.
“4—I am very sorry you had a bad experience some years ago in the UK. I am glad though you did find the care overall good (the sisters and native doctor). He sounds like a bad doctor, white, brown or lime green. I think you simply met a bad UK doctor. I would never suggest all our doctors are great. Like any field, some are better than others and some much less pleasant human beings.”
That is true, but 100% of my experiences with an “Asian” (don’t’ want to offend. . ha) were bad and this is a trend, not a one-off.
“I assume the 2006 incidents were US?”
And the late 80’s, yes, thereby demonstrating the issues with Asian third-world doctors are not simply confined to one nation. It is a problem that extends beyond borders.
“5—I would point out that the majority of UK Asian doctors are actually Sikh or Hindu. Both are highly regarded in the UK. As communities and as doctors and nurses. Sikh/Hindu and black doctors and nurses have been in the NHS since the mid 50s.”
Yes, I know, but it is clear the Asians I encountered were muslime. Is profiling bad, even it if is correct?
“Other non white non UK doctors will be of black African (from British Commonwealth countries) or black Caribbean (again Commonwealth). Or of course from Hong Kong or palces like Singapore. They all have a good to vg rep in the UK.”
Yes, and my experience – and posts – are about Asian doctors, not Caribbean or Asian (American version of the word).
“As for Muslim doctors, I have dealt with a few and I have to say they were perfectly fine. One I saw for an minor eye problem was superb.”
Glad to hear that, and glad to hear you, like me, can spot a muslime doc. Your experiences do not change mine. Good ones out there? Perhaps, but I’m not going to risk my life, or the life of my family that perhaps the next muslime doc knows what he is doing and is good at it, especially when 100% of my previous experiences demonstrate the exact opposite.
“UK doctors of Asian origin will either be proper ‘UK Asian’ ie British born from Sikh/Hindu/Muslim families long here since the 1950s or will be from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, former countries of the Empire and/or members of the British Commonwealth. And will have undertaken UK training over and above their own native study.”
Good, but they will never treat me or mine. I have a choice on who I/we see, and I exercise that choice based on experience. I cannot be blamed for exercising a choice based on past consistently negative experiences.
“True British?. Well, I have met curt and less than stellar ‘native’ UK doctors and nurses.”
Not me. But then again, I haven’t been in hospital over there as much as you have.
“The one bad nurse I had was Eastern European. So I base my opinion on individuals, not on their religion and race.”
“One” bad nurse is not a trend. My judgment is based on three consecutive negative experiences. That is a sample large enough to make a judgment call, in my opinion.
You know, the only person working hard and doing an excellent job in the Long Beach VA hospital I was in (horrible experience there, the VA is legendary in their poor performance), was Russian. She was outstanding.
Having a choice, I will not bet my (or my family’s) life or well-being on the chance the next muslime doc will be good when I know a basic White Male doc in the US made it into and graduated from medical school based on his performance and skills, not because he met some diversity quota or was educated in some third-world place.
A major point, third-world docs do not share first-world mores regarding respect for life, and complicating things is the fact that speech nuances and patterns between first-world and third-world do not translate well. Heck, as you fully know, speech nuances and patterns between Brits and Yanks sometimes do not translate well, either.
By the way, I do like and respect the Scots. One has to respect a people that the Roman Empire built a wall to keep out.
Yours in respectful disagreement, cheers,
“The procedure for the NHS emergencies (unless its seriously life threatening where you get taken straight through) “
Odd, that, the Ambulance crew went in search of ER staff and found them, and she was put in an ER treatment area, BUT the ER staff left before I could tell them what was up, and the doc, as explained earlier, didn’t care nor did he listen to me so the whole thing about life-saving immediate admission was never an option because no one listened. Yes, she did have the cancer return.
Didn’t “sneer” at the NHS, I just know any version of socialized medicine is a disaster, in the UK and here.
However, the Tea Lady did come by frequently. Not surprising, as we know tea is essential to patient care and recovery. . .said in semi-jest.
;-)
Cheers.
Yes, and addictive, too. I was hosted many times at various UK universities when I was a traveling guest lecturer in the late 90’s and they all, all said to me when planning for dinner; “You are American and never had a proper curry — or balti — so we will make sure you have one.”
At the end of two-years of lecturing I could eat the “hot” stuff. Lost that skill now.
And if my lectures were close to, or on, Burns Night, I had more than my share of Haggis. Yum. . . .
;-(
Imagine dialing that on those old rotary phones?
Hi.
1-—I wasn’t criticising you for shouting btw, I was just suggesting a reason why it got nowhere. NHS staff more and more sadly have to put with verbal abuse, so some staff will either overreact to it (ie security) or tune it out. In this case, just a bloody bad doctor. And rather perfunctory staff.
2—Re Brits abroad. Sadly, I agree. For every nice middle class and respectable working class couple or family, sadly the UK is now famous for drunken sex crazed louts in certain holiday areas like Spain or Ibiza or Cyprus. A national embarrassment. The rot started in the mid 80s with the Club 18-30 crowd. Add to summer holidays, the hen party and stag party idiots. You are supposed to be an idiot on those stag/hen nights, but in the old days you did it in your town or the next big city.
I still see the occasional loud obnoxious Yank stereotype on holiday, ironically they now tend to be women. LOL
I am glad to see we can still be insulting with some elan and grace, lol.
3—Paki started to be used in the 60s by the BNP types and racists as an insult. And remains so. I know in the US its just a contraction. I am genuinely not wanting you to get gyp in the UK if you use it by accident or design.
4—My superpower is spotting Muslims. No, seriously, I just summised by name and little observations, as well as educated ethnic guess ie skin colour and accent, that a couple of doctors I met were Muslim. Both non UK Muslims.
5—I have never spent an night in a UK hospital, NHS or private. I keep very good health. I have been referred to local hospitals for outpatient apps for physiotherapy (back injury 2000, knee injury 2010) and for a minor eye compliant last year (which turned to be just an inflammation caused by traces of oil on my hands badly irritating my eye). My experience is as the son of two parents who had good to great health until about 10 years ago and who have both suffered a heart attack and various ailments.
6—I agree on the issue of language. I speak English, god alone knows what you lot speak. Its English, to a point.
LOL
Hi again.
As a Brit, I apologise for any problem you encountered. I know I am lucky to have almost entirely great or good experience of the NHS, both hospital and GP.
The NHS is not the glorious panacea some claim, but nor is it a disaster. It has flaws, some minor and some major. It has its horror stories. It also has its success stories. IMO, as a Brit of 45 yrs, overall, it DOES work. It is over burdened and badly flawed in some areas. I would keep the NHS, I wouldn’t kill it off, I would make minor and radical changes, many to strip it back to its original noble purpose.
Americans are too dismissive of the NHS and too nationalistic about their own system (which I have minor experience of). Brits are too defensive of the NHS and too dismissive of the US system. Both have flaws. Both work.
I wasn’t sure how much of your post was genuinely thankful to the NHS and the UK and how much was polite sarcasm.
LOL, I love the old phones though.
Indian food in the US, at least to our Limey eyes, dosent have the huge cultural place in culture that Indian food does in ours. Curry seriously is the modern UK national dish. Unlike the polyglot US, it really wasn’t until the 50s that the UK was mass introduced to non European food or non North American: Indian, Chinese and to a much lesser extent Caribbean.
Since then, the UK has embraced all food cultures.
I too love haggis. Nice to find a ‘yank’ that does. Non Scots/Brits either simply refuse to try it or don’t like it.
I am curious as to your background re the UK: when did you live here?. Where have you been?. What did/do you like and dislike about the UK (and be honest).
I hope you better half recovered from the cancer and is well.
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