I did try to take pills, once, but this is about a time
when pills were forced on me.
I was generally very compliant in hospital, but one thing
you learn quickly as a patient is to always check your medication. Your nurse
will hand it to you in a little paper cup (like the kind you use to get your
ration of ketchup at fast food places. I think ketchup costs them a lot more
than the kind I buy. At least they’ve stopped handing it out in the tiny packages
that hold a quarter teaspoon).
Anyhow, you get this little paper cup and the first thing
you do is count the pills and look at the colours and shapes of them. You
learn, for example, that a milligram of Clonazepam is tiny and reddish orange,
while the half milligram is large, chalky and orange with a breaking line. Five
milligrams of Loxapine is a lime green tablet with a breaking line. Lithium
comes in a caplet – the ones with red are 100 milligrams, the half pink, half
white ones are 300mg. And so on. You toss them back, and then the nurse makes
you open your mouth to see if you swallowed everything.
One evening I spotted a tiny green tablet, only about two
millimetres in diameter, hiding at the bottom of my cup. I hadn’t seen one of
those before.
I stopped.
“What’s that? I’ve never taken this one before.”
The nurse picked up my chart (charts are gigantic
binders, full of all sorts of notes, doctor’s orders, test results, etc. They
don’t hang them on the end of your bed).
“It’s a sleeping pill,” she replied after a moment. “Your
doctor ordered it this morning.”
“He never told me about it. He didn’t even ask how I was
sleeping. I’m sleeping fine – you know that I am. I don’t want to take it.”
She looked concerned.
“Well, for some reason he decided you need it. Can you
please just take it tonight?”
I held my ground. I never want to take medication that I
don’t need.
“I’m sorry, Jodi, but I don’t need it and I won’t take a
medication unless my doctor has talked to me about it.”
She frowned. “So, you’re refusing a medication the doctor
ordered?”
“Yep,” I replied, folding my arms.
She was good. Instead of making a fuss, she made me do
some paperwork.
I had to sign forms waiving the hospital and nursing
staff of liability, and indicating that I was wilfully ignoring a doctor’s
orders.
The next morning I saw my psychiatrist. “Why did you
order sleeping medication for me?” I queried. I was a little upset.
“I just assumed you needed help sleeping, after all of
the stress you’ve been through, especially going through seclusion.”
“Thanks anyways, but please don’t make assumptions. I’m
sleeping fine.”
(I thought about that old aphorism – “You know what
happens when you assume? You’re an idiot.” That’s my version, anyways).
During my stay, I discovered three more medication
errors.
If you are ever hospitalized for anything (and I hope you
aren’t), always check your own medications.
It’s better to know exactly what’s in that little paper
cup than to not.
That’s why I’m so wary of fast-food ketchup.
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