BURLINGTON – The UVM Medical Center, formerly Fletcher Allen Hospital, formerly the Medical Center Hospital of Vermont, formerly Mary Fletcher Hospital, formerly a green hill overlooking Lake Champlain, has instituted some policy changes after a new study shows that phlebotomists have an easier time drawing blood from patients when the patients’ blood is boiling.
According to the study, first published in 2017 in the New England Journal of Mundunugus, blood is more difficult to draw when it is moving slowly in a placid or restful state. The most effective methods for taking blood involved having patients slowly get their steam up, raising their blood pressure over the course of 30-60 minutes, until the veins and arteries can barely contain the rage that has been simmering to a boil. When the blood reaches the peak point of fury conditions are optimal for labs to be run.
Part of the new system implemented at UVMMC involves having patients checking in multiple times in multiple places, often on different floors, before being acknowledged by a phlebotomist. The rules will also change depending on what day it is, who you are speaking to, or which way the wind is blowing. Even patients with a doctor’s referral, phone check in, pre-registration, and close familial relation to the attendant may be rerouted back to the third floor for registration again, but only on Saturdays. Signage has been removed that would have explained the new rules, and several circuitous informational displays send patients back and forth on a looped path looking for where to check in.
If patients do question the added layers of nonsensical redundancy and bureaucratic abuse, they are to be told that staff are “learning a new system,” or that “this is a temporary workaround,” and will then be given additional paperwork to fill out relating to the hospital’s updated privacy policy.
Initial results are encouraging, with patients reporting the highest levels of boiling blood in decades. Future studies will hopefully show whether these cutting-edge methods are having a positive effect on the blood itself, but for now the hospital is asking for patience, as this is a new system, and will only be a temporary workaround.
This would be even better if none of the hospital staff spoke English. Of course, then blood would boil even quicker and maybe defeat the purpose of delaying and obfuscating. A too efficient inefficiency?
Yes, it is a fine line between boiling and erupting.