I got to the hospital (OPD) records section to process my child's document; so we could see a doctor for treatment . So I spoke to the person in charge and she asked who is sick after presenting her the necessary information she needed. I responded to her question. Then she asked again "what is wrong with your child", I again responded to her question she followed with another question "how long has your child had that condition". At this time I asked myself "do doctors in this hospital work at the records section too? After asking all these questions she then processed the documents for me and directed me to a place where my child's vitals will be taken. There too I experienced the same thing except that the nurse taking the vitals called some of here colleagues who also came to do their own probing and then formed a quorum to discuss my child's condition and which doctor they think is best to see, before we were sent to the consulting room. This is what I call Consulting Outside the Consulting Room. If you are unfortunate and you are admitted, you'll have to explain to every nurse who comes on duty. While at the OPD, I realized am not the only one who experienced that but most of the patients especially, women, who came there.
Is it a strategy to get some patients to go back in order to cut down on the numbers? You see apart from the fact that this attitude is unethical, it is also time wasting and does a lot of harm to patients psychologically.
Consulting Outside the Consulting Room sometimes causes panic attacks in patients. Making patients feel their conditions are hopeless or they have to go through some expensive or painful treatment. This can get in the way of treatment; as patients become anxious and apprehensive during treatment.
It also lowers patients' confidence in some doctors, especially, if they couldn't meet the one (s) the nurses proposed. This causes disappointments in some patients when they get to the consulting room.
Again, Consulting Outside the Consulting Room, makes some patients to lie to the doctors about their conditions. All because of some comments a nurse made after probing them or a nurse's attitude towards them. So they tell themselves 'if a nurse is saying or doing this then, what will the doctor say or do'.
This attitude also prevents people especially women (mothers) from coming to the hospital because they do not want to be explaining their condition or that of their children to nurses amidst embarrassment. As a result, many mothers with babies take their babies for immunization only when they have to be given vaccination, which shouldn't be the case.
Nurses we know you mean well but this attitude is doing more harm than good.
