We have to write a few case reports this year, and one of the things that we're supposed to include is all the costs to the client. I had a case last week that was in hospital and got euthanised and necropsied on friday. It's been exactly one week since the farm visit, so I figured I could get my hands on the costings today. I never realised it would be such an ordeal.
Just like the other case report I did for a large animal, I went up to farm services and asked nicely for the costings. Last time, they looked up the case and printed it off. This time, they scratched their heads for a while trying to find the case, then scratched their heads for a while trying to find costings. One person asked another who asked another, and eventually they told me it hadn't been done yet.
So I went over to the vet, relayed what I'd been told, and asked for costings. She said the reception should have them. Reception said she should have them. We went out to reception to find them. Turns out they were on 2 different sheets on 2 different desks (one for the farm visit, one for the hospital stay). A nurse kindly offered to type them in right then and print them out for me. Phew! Finally. Thanks for doing that, sorry to bother you.
A few hiccups typing them in meant it took rather a while. The patient sheet was a huge mess because like half a dozen students had tried to write things on it, and of course no one put their notes in any of the correct places. Also someone had given a drug but not told me what exactly they'd drawn up, so I knew it was a vitamin B injection, but not which product it was. Nurse sighed about this, but took it in stride, without much more than a "They never help us" comment.
Then, just as she's about to finish, smack from the printer next to me. Or rather, from the cow vet standing at the printer next to me. He was trying to swipe his town library card instead of his university ID card, so it wouldn't read it or let him print. He got frustrated enough to punch the touch screen, which cracked it. Like, cracks radiating from the centre, covering the entire screen. And guess what--it's a touch screen. Even though the display didn't break, it wouldn't register the touches anymore, so the nurse wasn't able to actually select "print" for her document.
After a bit of a kerfuffel among the receptionists and some eye-rolling behind cow vet's back, the nurse and I headed for the vet tower. The vet tower is under a lot of construction, which means whenever you want to get through the hospital you have to re-route through some strange convoluted path. Eventually, we made it to a printer there, only to find someone in front of us trying to print. On a broken printer.
Fortunately, it turns out that printer only needed paper. Unfortunately, there wasn't any. The nurse went on a brief hunt, found a box, then no scissors with which to open the box. New hunt for scissors.
Finally, the printer was set to go. The other person printed her big pile of stuff. With bated breath, we waited while the printer charged up ours. And then at long last, I got my one little sheet with the list of costs for my calf.
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