Patients Lacking Patience When Listening To The Lisp

It’s October of 2021. I just got braces around four or five weeks ago, and they also put something called a bite block (turbo/ramp) on the back of my two front teeth, so I’ve been talking with a lisp now.

My job is regarding [contagious illness] cases, but things have gotten slow and cases have been low, leaving me with a lot of downtime. I ask my supervisor if there is anything I can do in my downtime, and she gives me a project to work on. The pop-up diabetes clinic they recently opened does not have a front desk clerk yet — they are in the process of hiring one — so I can help them out with patient outreach.

Sure, why not? I have to call patients with high HbA1c (glycated hemoglobin) levels to schedule their appointments and also call patients to remind them of their appointments. It sounds easy enough.

The first person I have to call is an older woman.

Me: “Hi, Mrs. [Patient]. We ran a report, and your hemoglobin levels are high. We would like to schedule you an appointment with—”

Patient: *Cutting me off* “WHAT? I DIDN’T UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU SAID!”

I repeat it again, slowly.

Patient: “Yeah? And what about it?”

Me: “We would like to schedule you an appointment for the diabetes clinic.”

Patient: “Okay. What day? Can it be this Friday?”

I begin to inform her that we only have this pop-up clinic on Mondays, but she cuts me off again, yelling.

Patient: “I ASKED IF IT COULD BE FRIDAY, AND I CAN’T UNDERSTAND YOU DUE TO THE WAY YOU TALK! YOU ARE NOT MAKING ANY SENSE!”

Me: “I apologize for my lisp, ma’am.”

Patient: “WELL, I CAN’T UNDERSTAND THE WAY YOU TALK!”

Me: “I’m sorry, ma’am. Someone else will call you to set up an appointment.”

She gets angry about that, as well.

Patient: “You called me just to tell me someone else will be calling me? Am I getting the appointment or not?!”

After that, I spoke to her veerrrryyyyyy slowly and loudly, and what should’ve taken me five minutes to schedule ended up taking fifteen minutes. I still had to repeat myself a couple of times, too.

After that, I called around thirty other patients, and no one else had a problem with the way I talked. My colleagues don’t think my lisp is that bad, either; one of them didn’t even notice I HAD a lisp.

I have to call [Patient] to remind her of her appointment soon. That will be fun.