A few months ago I had a kidney stone, and today I had scheduled a visit to the urologist. This is a transcript of the conversation we had.
“Age?" the urologist said as I opened the door.
“35,” I replied while still entering the room.
“Any diseases?" I was still closing the door.
“Diseases?" I said, not quite sure how to answer that question.
"Any diseases that you had!," he said holding a pen while looking to blank sheet of paper.
"Measles, mumps, chicken pox ..." I said as I approached the chair that was in front of his desk, where I was supposed to be seated before starting any relevant conversation.
“Any chronic, important diseases!” He shouted as he continued holding his pen with his eyes fixed on the sheet.
“Good morning!” I said as I sat on the chair. At that time the urologist looked up and made eye contact with me for the first time since I entered the room.
“Why did you come?” he looked away and stared to the paper once again.
"I had a kidney stone and I was sent here by my family doctor for a checkup.” I handed him the report my doctor gave me. The urologist took the papers and looked at his nurse, who had spent the entire time I was there typing at a computer. Then he told her, "Let's see what we can do for this sick person.”
“Where is the envelope that came with it?” he asked me, leaving the papers aside without even looking at them.
"My doctor just gave me the papers like that, I was given no envelope.”
"Listen! From now on," he took an envelope out of a drawer, “whenever you come here you bring all relevant documents inside this envelope." He then placed my doctor's report in the envelope. At this point in the conversation I did not whether to stand up and leave or take out a notebook and say, ‘Sorry, I'm just going to note down about the envelope so I do not forget it.’
"Well, tell me what's wrong with you! Any pain? Symptoms?”
"Well, I don’t have any pain anymore.”
"So, asymptomatic," he replied.
"Yes, I suppose that's the right term, well I had a kidney stone and it hurt a lot before, but since I peed it out ... all the pain is g…”
“Where is this calculus?” He asked without letting me finish my sentence.
"It’s being analyzed.”
"I don’t understand. Without the test results I cannot receive you. Did you have a x-ray of the abdomen?”
“No.”
"Well, you get that done and bring me the test results of the calculus, make an appointment for later,” he started to fill in a form for the x-ray and without even looking at me he continued, “The only thing I can tell until then is: ‘drink plenty of water.’” He passed the form to the nurse who gave it to me together with the envelope.
"Goodbye," said the nurse going looking back at her computer screen.
"Goodbye and Happy Holidays," I said, watching the scene of two people engrossed in their own worlds. I had just been a disruption in their autistic morning.
