Some stories are worth memorializing. This story would be one of them. When I heard it first, I smiled. After I
thought about it, I laughed.
My brother in law is a doctor. A retired doctor but one who spent his entire
career as a practicing Internist. Not only
is he a retired doctor but one of the smartest doctor’s I have ever known. Additionally, he is probably the nicest
person I have ever met. Patience is a virtue. He has always had plenty of it.
IF only my son’s next-door neighbor could have known the
person was coming to help when he frantically asked his daughter to go next
door to the neighbor’s house to get help.
My wife was babysitting grandchildren the last several days
in Alpharetta while the parents were out of town. My wife’s sister came on Friday to help. The doctor dropped his wife off on Friday and
came back on Saturday to pick her up.
While sitting in the den on Saturday morning, an obviously upset
preteen girl came in asking for my son –not knowing my son was not at
home. She explained that her mom was not
home and her dad was lying on the bedroom floor in excruciating pain. He asked her to go next door to get help.
The dad thought he was getting an insurance underwriter to
come to his rescue. He had no way of knowing he was summoning an experienced doctor
to come to his aid.
The doctor followed the daughter next door and up some back
stairs and finally in the neighbor’s bedroom.
He found the neighbor on the bedroom floor just as the daughter had
described. As the doctor was checking
the unsuspecting patient, their little dog must have thought he was an
intruder. He latched on the doctor’s
heel – with his teeth. The doctor was
now multi-tasking - attempting to evaluate his unsuspecting patient while their
dog was in attack mode. Thankfully, the son came to the rescue and pulled the
little dog off the patient but now startled doctor.
It turns out the most likely cause of the patient’s
condition was severe back spasms. Since
I have experienced the same, I can related to his condition and pain. The neighbor had already called his chiropractor
while lying on the floor before the doctor arrived.
After some questions, the doctor eventually helped his
patient get up and somehow got him in the backseat of the doctor’s Ford
Expedition. The doctor of course had no
idea of the location of the chiropractor’s office. Not one to use GPS for directions, the doctor
relied on the patient to direct him to the office. . As the patient was lying on the backseat, he
would lift his head up every now to look out the window to tell the doctor when
to turn.
After they arrived at the chiropractor’s office, the doctor
sat in the waiting room while the patient received treatment. The doctor had the patient’s personal
belongings including his cell phone with him in the waiting room. The patient’s cell phone rang a couple of
times. The doctor went back and asked
the patient if he was familiar with the caller.
“Yes, that’s my wife. Please
answer when she calls back.”
The wife did call back.
She was very appreciative of the doctor’s services (although she
probably did not know he was a doctor) and said she was on the way. The patient doctor said it was not
necessary. He was there and was noticing
there were plenty of magazines to read.
The patient doctor stayed in the waiting room until the
patient’s treatment was completed. He then
drove the slightly improved patient back to his house.
I suppose that is how a patient doctor treats a unsuspecting
patient who finds himself in a predicament.
I am not sure there are many patient doctors out there like my brother
in law.
In fact, I am positive of that.
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