A Friday laugh…’bout food
…no, I am not sharing any joke I received via the net. This one is the headline from the Observer which made me smile while having my cuppa tea this morning. See what prisoners demanding to be given to eat! Black Forest cake and cranberry juice to rahtid! 
I wonder which doctor made these dietary suggestions? Somehow ackee and saltfish and black forest cake don’t make up part of a diabetic diet…but then again…who am I? Just a Dermatologist, right? Stay deh. I do have to make dietary suggestions for patients when we admit them….I don’t necessarily write a ‘menu’…but I would not be too happy to see black forest cake coming from the kitchen for a diabetic…lest it be sugar free. As for cranberry juice….I have noted here in recent times that it has become a popular chaser especially with vodka drinkers….I wonder if is liquor dem want to chase with the cranberry inna lockup? Seems dem feel dat dem at dem yard. Black Forest cake….been a long time I haven’t had any…maybe I should get me some. Anyway, I found the headline quite a good laugh to start the Friday morning.
That story reminds me of last week. We on our ward round. Have a male pateint in his late thirties who we admitted. Have Sickle Cell disease with a chronic leg ulcer which we grafted for him. Could barely walk good when we admitted him because of pain in the ulcer. Graft healing nicely….just waiting for a few more days of healing before we discharge him….apart from that, he should be kriss…unless some new problem pop up that we are unaware of. We reach him bed…face well sour. We ask how he is….”Not good!” We enquire what the problem is. We note that his breakfast….some nice whole wheat bread with saltfish and cabbage is covered up in front of him not touched. “De kitchen cyaan cook food to suit me! So, I not eating it. I doh eat bread and dem send bread wid mi breakfast. I doh like cabbage! And I tell dem I doh eat tinned food, pork or beef and last night is beef stew dem send for mi dinner……” Of course, I lose interest long time.
Look, the hospital is not a hotel. Is a place fe sick people. I am not saying the kitchen is perfect, but they do try, and they are a lot better than previously. That breakfast of saltfish and cabbage was better than what I had at mi yard the same morning. I have seen cases where the patient complains about a meal, they return it and when the replacement meal comes the patient seh dem not eating it cause it cold, or dem lose dem appetite.
My take on this…whenever the patient’s main complaints are non-medical, solely about food..is time for discharge. When people really sick, they scarcely even want to eat. In addition to that….ask if plenty of dem who complaining about the food have the first dollar to pay towards their hospital bill. In addition, there are some patients who not getting three meals a day with in between snacks at dem house…nuff o dem gain weight in hospital as they are being better fed.
Any of you ever been in hospital? What was your take on the food? I won’t enquire if you ever been in lockup. You can keep dat unda wraps. Anyhow, this talk about food is getting me hungry….I wonder what fare I can rustle up? I know for sure no cranberry juice deh yah! Sorry ’bout the trivial nature of the post again, but a so life go sometime. TGIF people.
May 27th, 2005 at 8:49 am Hi Dr. D. Discharge dem yes-so many people starving in this world and they complain. I’ve heard criminals repeatedly committing petty crimes so that they can get locked up to get three meals a day and roof over their heads, even if it’s in jail. Anyway, have a great weekend. Long one for us-Memorial Monday.
May 27th, 2005 at 9:12 am Actually it not petty at all. it made for a really good laugh this morning. I don’t buy those things simply because of cost…is which part dem tink dem is? Must Ritz-Carlton or one of the all inclusives. Somebody need to remind dem sey ah prison dem deh.
May 27th, 2005 at 10:15 am next ting them asking fa caviar lol. Black Forest Cake, them know how expensive a slice a dat duz sell?
May 27th, 2005 at 10:55 am I was in Bustamante Children’s hospital in 1972. Food was yummy. The first thing that I said when I opened my eye after the appendectomy was “I’m hungry”. I remember mince and carrots, sardine sandwiches, and jello. All good stuff. If I remember correctly, I would ask for seconds too…..just like I used to at home!
May 27th, 2005 at 10:57 am Those prisoners real amusing.Lol,I could have seen with them if they asking for some fruit or something so.Wrt to hospital the food is kinda like what you get on airplanes-don’t exactly taste like home but it won’t kill you.
May 27th, 2005 at 11:43 am De prisioners and hospital patients want work. I was doing follow-up on the prision situation in B’dos and de prisioners did complaing bout de food. Dem should come and serve some time here in Venezuela, where if yuh family doan bring food for you, you don’t get any to eat. The prisioners get one bowl ah rice a day and anything else them want, they have to buy. As for hospital food. It’s always gonna be a no win situation for the kitchen staff, trying to please all de people. The hubby just had his stay and although the food wasn’t the best, it did provide the basic nutrients.
May 27th, 2005 at 9:44 pm I am working hard enough to feed them in prison, when they made stupid choses in life and yet they are still seeking more.
May 27th, 2005 at 9:46 pm Correction: stupid CHOICES
May 28th, 2005 at 9:42 am You know say is lobster and shrimp, mahi mahi and shyte like that the man dem eat at Northward Prison? At least, is so I hear. Apparently the fear of prison is not such a big deterrent over here…
May 28th, 2005 at 11:46 am Rude yute, take the Musical Baton if you’re of a mind to nuh?
May 28th, 2005 at 12:11 pm MB, I had a cousin who did time in Cayman, he did say is seafood dem eat dere….dem lucky is all I can seh.
May 29th, 2005 at 9:04 am Oh great, now I’ll have Julie Andrews’ voice stuck in my head all day. Stupes…
May 29th, 2005 at 9:05 am Ah crap! Wrong window. Disregard.
May 30th, 2005 at 11:56 pm I too think when the patients complain about the food it is time to get them moving on out. I have of course eaten hosptial food being that I work in a hospital, and I have been a patient the three times I gave birth in addition I’d been in for surgery once in the last decade. ……..anyway, to the food, well, it is ok - sure I can get better at home, much of the tim - but what the hospital kitchen delivers has been good enough to do the trick when I have have been a patient. As staff I don’t eat the food too often as I get tired of it quick, and with meal times unpredictable for me it is better to have my own food on hand.