I always know when Christmas is coming because a tin of Quality Street will appear at the nurses’ station.
Obviously, Quality Street is the worst of the boxed chocolates and has been scientifically proven to last longer on a ward than any other option, but it still fills me with joy to see that purple tin.
Christmas in a hospital tends to be a special and strange time. Generally nothing changes – patients are just as unwell, the wards are just as overcrowded, and we are working just as hard – but this work is now accompanied by tinsel and twinkling lights.
To me, a doctor, all of the joyful parts of the holiday become heightened on the ward.
When compared to the beeping monitors or constantly ringing phones, carol singers at the hospital sing more sweetly than those I pass on the street. Tacky decorations held up with surgical tape and staples, or made from blown-up gloves and dressings, look more festive than anything I have at home.
It’s the contrast between the clinical and the magical that makes the difference.
Of course, our day-to-day work doesn’t change and the frivolity of Christmas can feel jarring.
People still die; people still get feared diagnoses and still deteriorate, and it can be hard for everyone – doctors included – when this happens surrounded by celebration.
I have a personal rule that I won’t wear Christmas jumpers to work, as I don’t want to have to break bad news wearing something ridiculous – but I’ve worked with colleagues that have the opposite view. They feel that the smallest bit of happiness and laughter is valuable even in the darkest moments.
That’s what I really like about Christmas in hospital – the proof that it’s possible to bring joy to these difficult places during potentially very painful times.
That was certainly my grandfather’s view.
My grandfather was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon and used to spend every Christmas Day on the ward with his patients, always in fancy dress and often accompanied by his children, dressed as elves or presents.
Although I have been very fortunate as I’ve never actually worked on Christmas Day itself – but instead worked seven out of 10 New Year’s Eves since graduating – hospitals have had a lasting effect on my family Christmases.
My grandfather was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon and used to spend every Christmas Day on the ward with his patients, always in fancy dress and often accompanied by his children, dressed as elves or presents.
He would carve the turkey and hand out gifts, and make sure that all of his patients were having as good a holiday as was possible under the circumstances. For him, Christmas Eve was for family and Christmas Day was for the hospital, and my mum continued that tradition with her own children.
To this day, we open our presents on Christmas Eve and have a big dinner together, in the knowledge that either my sister – who is a midwife – or I may not be there the following day.
Hospitals have changed considerably since the 70s and I’m not sure that it’s even possible to take an entire roast turkey with all the trimmings onto the wards anymore, but I do always think of Granddaddy whenever I’m on the wards around this time.
He prioritised his patients to such an extent that it quite literally moulded my family traditions, which reminds me how important our work during this holiday period can be.
Because there are always patients without family to visit them at Christmas.
Patients who are lonely, sick, and scared. Patients who need us – and not just in a medical capacity.
For those people, the presence of hospital staff who genuinely care about them is a source of comfort and companionship, and I love how even a basic turkey dinner and some tinsel can make a dreary hospital ward feel festive.
Of course, all the Christmas cheer in the world can’t change the fact that most patients would rather be anywhere else.
For many – especially the elderly or those with complex needs – there is no provision or money for home care, while others will be kept in hospital because their illness is simply proving to be too stubborn.
We’re there to help those people too, and to do as much as we can to get them home as soon as is physically and logistically possible.
My job can be stressful, difficult and exhausting, but even on a 12-hour Boxing Day shift, there is a silver lining (like eating my body weight in Quality Street).
MORE: What it’s like to spend Christmas day in hospital
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source https://metro.co.uk/2019/12/23/as-a-doctor-working-on-christmas-day-you-see-the-best-of-humanity-11223285/
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