Geriatrics, The Beginning

Most people dread the required Geriatrics rotation. Not me, I'm looking forward to dealing with this segment of the population. It's primary care to its core, with patient interactions largely occurring in nursing homes or home visits. You'd think the orientation would basically be this shoo-shee froo-froo type affair, telling us how great old people are. But no, they get hardcore immediately.

"Do you any of you have allergies? Because some of these patients have, like, thirty cats. And if the cat dander doesn't kill you, your mold allergies will."

Even better, the clerkship coordinator gives us several safety tips for our home visits:

• Always travel in groups.
• Never offer transportation to the patient or their family members.
• Mace doesn't work.
• If attacked, yell "Fire!" instead of "Help!" or "Police!"
• There is some evidence that supports the fact that medical care workers are granted some amount of amnesty when traveling through unsafe neighborhoods, so wear your identification badge prominently.

The speaker concludes cheerfully,"We haven't lost a student yet, and we don't plan to..." Still, I'd feel a little better if they had standard issue body armor for this rotation.