I’ve decided to write this article after I read a “complaint” published by AK – 24 and written by a medical resident: “A doctor’s angry message – What means when you give 5 RON to a hairdresser after a haircut – this is not a tip? The young residents’ dramatic stories”. You can find the article here.
Humiliations
A young doctor says that she hasn’t heard before starting medicine that the doctors are humiliated and their salaries are low. So, young doctor, I will tell you exactly how things are going: first of all, I don’t care your salary, it’s your choice to be a doctor and you have to practice medicine conscientiously or you have to give up this job and start another one paid better. Then, you have to take care of patients no matter your salary, you have taken the Hippocratic’ oath and I don’t think this oath has a financial passage. Am I right? But I won’t take into consideration this oath because in our country the oath represents only a formality it doesn’t have a value neither for doctors nor for those who work in justice, police, etc. I will tell you something about your salary, low or big no matter how it is, it comes from the taxes paid by us, people who do not take oaths but work hard every day and sometimes need you, the doctors. This doesn’t mean to come to you, as doctor/resident/nurse and give you a tip in order to treat me, the patient. I consider that you humiliate yourself when you complain in the article that you are waiting for a tip of 10 RON to buy a pretzel, believe me, this is self humiliation, no one humiliates you. I believe it is hard, you need more for a better life, in our country the scale of values is out of parameters but, believe me, there are others methods to increase your income. First of all, instead of wasting time complaining, if you are a good resident, you can try to find a job in private sector. There are many young people working there being trained and they know good manners, they look up to patients and they understand the rules: the patient pays. You and your husband could be on call at a hospital, not both of you in the same time, but to be on call or to work supplementary hours mean much money and you can work for a few hours per day in private sector. There are solutions if you want to have money. I understand you have a child but you have parents to help you. You say you can’t pay a nanny for your child. What a waste! Have you ever had a nanny? Or a German governess? And I wonder how is possible to say that until 11 o’clock in the morning 30 patients talks to you ugly? In 2 hours, between 9.00 and 11.00, it’s impossible to see 30 patients, are you a superwoman? And secondly, are all of them rude and ill-mannered? I know that there are a lot of rude and ill-mannered people in this country but I don’t think that only these people are getting ill and come to hospital. How could I explain you, doctor, that things are different? You have to treat the patient no matter nationality, religion, etc. and most of the time the patients are humiliated by the doctors in a hospital, because patients are not treated if they don’t have money to give a tip to doctor/ nurse or they don’t have acquaintances in that hospital. A patient should find a way to make the doctor to pay attention to him faster not after 3 or 4 hours and to be sure the medical treatment is correct. I don’t want to generalize, but most of the time this happens in the state hospitals. We, the patients, are humiliated although we are ill and need medical care. The patients should be humble in order to be treated properly by the doctors.
Nurses
This happens in case of nurses too. Most of the time they are very important persons in a state hospital and the patients should treat them properly, giving them tips in order to have a good accommodation in hospital with everything you need. Shall I tell you how I‘ve been treated by the head assistant at the urology hospital, the only one in Bucharest? How I waited for about 2 hours until she was willing to pay attention to me? I had kidney crises, terrible pains. I had to sit on the floor because no one gave me a chair or something like that; I was waiting for the documents necessary for the doctor to do the medical tests, not big deal. This is the assistant duty but doesn’t matter who has sent you there or if you have all the necessary documents for a day hospitalization…useless…the head assistant is more important than the doctor or the hospital director. She wants a tip for everything she does.
Sick care system
But, doctor, not the patients are the problem of this system; the first problem is given by those who work in this defective medical system. All the personnel, the assistants, the nurses who think they are the God on the Earth; they work as much as they want, when they want and for whom they want. And those older doctors who don’t want to give you, the young doctors, the difficult medical cases, being afraid they won’t receive money anymore and you will replace them in future, those who consider the young doctors a threat, financially and professionally. You won’t become good doctors because of those older doctors not because of those 30 patients you should see every morning, until 11 o’clock. Those doctors try to stop you being afraid of losing the jobs and the tips, etc. The medicine faculty is extremely difficult, but most of you, who become students at this faculty, are attracted by the earnings, but unfortunately, when you are young , you don’t think that the earnings rises in the same time with the age, the experience, etc. And this happens everywhere not only in case of doctors. Another reason of becoming a doctor is the desire of observing the family tradition. If at least one of the parents is doctor, the child will be a doctor too. Yes, doctor, it’s hard, but nothing is easy, and, in this country, it’s very hard to make a way if you are honest, intelligent and well-educated. You are an example of what I say here considering your expectations of having a decent life taking tips from patients. Shall I talk about the conditions offered by most of the state hospitals? Do you think that we, the patients should be happy and content with these miserable conditions? I don’t think so. I am sick of it.
Tips at beauty salons and restaurants
Yes, all of us give tips at hairdresser, restaurant, but this is our choice because we are content, we do not pay taxes every month for these activities. And in case I am not content with the hairdresser or waiter performance, I won ‘t give any tip and I will stop going there probably I‘ll tell others not to go there and this is not good for him. They will try to do the best in order to have clients and good recommendations; they need clients to have a good salary and a good life. Their salary depends on their work not on the taxes paid by us every month. You, as doctors, have a salary and this doesn’t depend on your number of patients. Small or big, doesn’t matter, you will receive a salary at the end of the month. Besides, in case of restaurants and beauty salons, the tips are available all over the world, there are places where the tip is included in the price or in the check (10%) (UK, France). I don’t know how can you make these comparisons. Try to give a tip at a doctor in UK and you will see the result. They will call police. So doctor, how is in Romania?
I take pity on you, Doctor. You have wasted so much time graduating medicine and now it is more important for you the tips for hairdressers, restaurants, etc. than practicing medicine at high standards.
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