Doctor Jokes

Did you hear the one about…..

When I was a kid, used to like reading my Mom’s copy of Readers Digest (Yes, in someways, I was a weird kid). I especially used to like the humor sections. One such section I recall reading was titled “Laughter is the Best Medicine”, which featured medically related jokes.

I still have more Bizarro posts, but they’re really starting to get my blood boiling. So I’ve decided to take a short break from all this heavy discussion and lighten things up a bit with some medical humor.

However, please be forewarned that these are jokes that you wouldn’t find on the pages of Reader’s Digest.

Here we go:

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Q: How many Chiropractors does it take to change a light bulb?

A: Only one, but it takes 30 – 40 visits.

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A doctor is on the first green of a golf course. He goes to write down his score and absent-mindedly pulls a rectal thermometer out of his shirt pocket. When he realizes what he’s done, he curses under his breath. When his golfing partners ask him what’s wrong, he complains “some asshole has my pencil”.

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Did you hear about the pediatric gynecologist who went to the eye doctor? It seems that everything was looking fuzzy to him.

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A brain surgeon wakes up on a Sunday morning to discover that a pipe leak has flooded his basement. After frantically calling around, he finally finds a plumber who is willing to come out on a Sunday. The plumber goes down into the basement, walks up to the leaking pipem removes a wrench from his back pocket, and stops the leak with a few quick turns. He then hands the doctor a bill for $500.00. The doctor is incensed – he yells at the plumber “I’m a BRAIN SURGEON and I don’t make $500 for 5 minutes work! The plumber shrugs and says “that’s why I gave up my practice…”

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A doctor meets a lawyer at a cocktail party. The doctor complains how everyone is always asking him for free advice. He can’t figure out how to put an end to it. The lawyer says “That’s easy – do what I do. Whenever I give someone legal advice, I simply mail them a bill for my time. Either they pay my bill, or they quick asking me for free advice”. The doctor exclaims “That’s brilliant! I’m going to start doing just that!” The doctor was thrilled with his new-found solution until the next day, when he received a bill in the mail from the lawyer….

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A Washington, DC based doctor is driving with his young son in the car. His son asks “Daddy, what do they call that big building downtown where men sit around all day and argue about how to run things?” The doctor answers “they call it the hospital”

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Q: What’s the difference between an Oral and a Rectal thermometer?

A: The flavor

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Famous American architect Frank Lloyd Wright supposedly once complained that “Doctors can bury their mistakes – all I can do is plant vines.”

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Q: How many surgeons does it take to fix a light bulb?

A: None. Scalpels can’t cut through glass

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Did you hear about the gay male nurse?

He was so good, he could make a patient without disturbing the bed!

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Michelle Obama was touring a hospital to see first hand how national health care was affecting patient care. When the tour arrived at the Urology section of the hospital, she was shocked to see an entire ward of elderly men sitting on their beds masturbating. “What’s going on here!” she demanded. The doctor giving the tour explained that all these men suffered from enlarged prostates, and since prostate surgery was not covered under national health care, that this was the only way they could get any relief. Next they came to a semi-private room, where they found another elderly man, who was being serviced by a young candy striper. Even more shocked, she asked “…and what’s going on HERE!!!” Her tour guide explained “He’s got the same issue as those other guys, but he’s got Blue Cross”

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Q: A Valedictorian finishes first in their class and a Salutatorian finishes second in their class. What is the special name that they give to the person who finished LAST in their class at Medical School?

A: Doctor

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The importance of a good vocabulary

A young man visits a surgeon and asks to be castrated. The surgeon is shocked, and explains how this is a very a drastic procedure for a young man to have and urges him him to reconsider..

“No,” says the young man, “I have thought long and hard about it, I have read all there is about it and my mind is made up. I must have the operation.”

The operation was duly carried out and when he had recovered from the anesthetic and was back in the ward he got to talking to the other patients.

“And what are you in here for?” he asked the fellow in the next bed.

“To be circumcised.”

“DAMN, THAT was the word I was looking for!”


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A Proctologist, giving a vigorous examination, remarks “I think I’ve found something. I’m feeling a series of hard nodules.”

The winching patient replied “I think they’re my molars…”

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A guy meets a psychologist at a cocktail party. He tells the doctor “…you wanna talk about CRAZY…..my brother thinks that he’s a CHICKEN!”

The doctor replies that this is a sign of a severe psychosis, and that the man should take him to see a mental health professional as soon as possible.

The man just shrugs his shoulders and sighs “I would, but I need the eggs.”

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A grossly overweight woman is so depressed about her weight that she seeks out the services of a noted psychologist. At her first appointment, she is ushered into the doctor’s office, which is empty except for the desk where the doctor is seated. He instructs her “Lie down on the floor in front of my desk”. Puzzled, but never having been to a psychologist before, she obliges. The doctor studies her large, prone figure and then remarks “No – that isn’t it – lie down under the window”. Again she obliges, and after a few more moments of contemplation the doctor says “No – that isn’t it either – lie down next to the door”. She does as she’s told, but the doctor still shakes his head and says “No-no –no- try lying down against the far wall”. Once again, she complies and the doctor says “That’s it! You are severely depressed over your weight and how people don’t see you as a complete and valuable person. The key for you is to realize that your worth as a person is not in any way related to your weight and size. Once you’ve reached that understanding, you will be able to move on with a full, productive and happy life!”

The woman undergoes a catharsis. She leaps to her feet, and thanks the doctor profusely. “You are a miracle worker! That’s exactly the insight that I needed! And to think – you were able to diagnose me without having me say a single word – just by having me lay down on your floor in different spots. AMAZING!”

The doctor laughed and said “That had nothing to do with it. Your problem was obvious the second you waddled through my door. It’s just that I’m having a new couch delivered this afternoon, and I’m trying to figure out where to put it.”

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Alright - that's enough for now. Maybe I'll do this again.

Do you know any good medical jokes? If so, please send them to me and I'll include them the next time I do a Doctor Joke blog.

Just make sure that they're in bad taste!



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Bizarro #5 – Gas Pains

Ouch. I just heard that they think gasoline might soon reach 5 bucks a gallon. Oh joy.

I just paid $3.35 for a gallon of regular on the Turnpike today. Actually, I’m secretly thrilled about this – it’s actually quite a bargain.

Here’s how I see it:

The cost of a barrel of crude oil has just topped $105.00. Since that barrel consists of 42 gallons of the brown sticky stuff, this means that crude oil itself is selling at $2.50 cents a gallon. After refining, that barrel will yield about 20 gallons of gasoline. The remainder of that barrel will be made into other valuable products, such as diesel fuel, #2 heating oil, and lubricants. Most of these products are actually more costly than gasoline, but let’s not quibble – for the sake of argument, let’s just say that the cost of ‘raw’ gasoline is $2.50 a gallon.

If Big Oil starts selling it for 5 bucks a gallon, this would mean that they are marking up the raw materials by 100% - doubling the price of the raw product. The actual mark up is much less, because the 5 buck purchase price includes things like state and federal taxes, but for the sake of argument, we’ll say that Big Oils’ markup is a healthy 100%.



So, how do you think that Americans are going to react to that $5.00 gallon of gas? Do you think that we’ll be dancing in the streets singing ‘I’m so Glad we’re Living in the USA’? Or do you think that there will be protests and general bitchiness about the price of gas and how Big Oil is raping the American public? Based upon recent history, I’d bet on the second scenario.

I think that America will no longer tolerate outrageous profits made by big petrochemical companies. Good for us.

So, how come we put up with mark ups from other giant chemical companies that make the profit margin in gasoline look like the bargain of the century?



(Note: By other ‘giant chemical companies’, I am referring to, of course, America’s pharmaceutical industry.) These guys make Exxon look like an also-ran in the arena of ludicrous mark up. Just because they are part of the health care industry, Big Pharm gets a pass from the American public when it comes to outrageous markups.

Bizarro.

Let me elaborate.

A recent investigation by Channel 7 News in Detroit showed that Generic Drugs enjoy a markup from the cost of the raw materials of as much as 3,000 percent. If gasoline were marked up at the same rate, that gallon of gas would run you a cool $75.00. Now you know why WalMart is hawking those $10 generic prescriptions – they’re probably the highest profit margin item in the entire store.

Keep in mind that this is for the ‘no-name’ generic drugs – what’s the profit margin on our favorite ‘branded’ prescription drugs?

Glad you asked.

Let’s look at the markups for some of our ‘Rock Star’ drugs – America’s best sellers. We’ll start with Lipitor, the Bono of prescription medicine.

According to the NJ Attorney general’s web site, a 90 day supply of the #1 selling drug would run me about $460.00 bucks. The raw material cost to make those pills is a whopping $5.80. This translates to a markup of 7,931%. Our $5 gallon of gas, at this markup, would run us around $198.00 per gallon.

Does this revelation driving you crazy? Why not take some Prozac?



At about $250 for a 90 day supply, this little helper contains just 11 cents of raw materials which translates to a nice healthy markup of 227,272%. At this rate, that gallon of regular is going to sell for $5,682.50.

Almost a quarter-million percent markup. I never realized that percentages went that high. As astronomical as the number is, Prozac isn’t even the markup king.


In fact, it isn’t even close.

So far, the current champ is Xanax, which runs about $140.00 for a 90 day supply. Here, the raw ingredient cost is just under 2.5 cents, for an industry leading markup of 568,300%. At this rate, that gallon of regular would run you just over $14,200.00.




Oops – I forgot to add 9/10’s to the end of all those projected gas prices.gas prices. Mea culpa.

There is a positive side to all these gasoline markups – at these margins, our service stations would once again be able to give you a free steak knife when you fill your tank. At over a quarter million dollars to fill an averaged size tank, that steak knife will come in handy to slice your wrists with. Try not to get too much blood on the rich Corinthian leather.













Maybe they could start offering S&H Green Stamps again as well. If they do, I’m going to get enough stamps for a sailboat every time I fill up the Volvo. How exciting.













Of course, we’ll never see those kind of mark ups for gasoline. If gas was marked up that much, it would destroy the US economy. The government would never allow it.

Those crazy mark ups are allowed, of course, in the world of health care, especially with prescription medications. High drug prices are helping cripple the health care sector of the US economy, yet the US government has yet to step in and stop it. Instead, they’ve historically enacted legislation that helps ensure that that we continue to pay the highest prices for prescription medicines in the world.

Bizarro, indeed.







***** Found this Interesting, Entertaining or Informative? Please read the complete blog at: *****
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Bizarro #4 – How much is That Darvon in the Window?

We are a consumer driven society. Now that we’re faced with tough economic times, almost everyone is price conscious. Rumor has it that even Donald Trump is clipping coupons from the Sunday circular (He does, after all, come from a long line of coupon clippers).

Drive by almost any retail store, and you can see their latest sales and promotions emblazoned across their front windows, in letters so tall that they make the New York Post jealous.

I have long been a comparison shopper: Before making a purchase, I want to be reasonably assured that I am getting a fair price. I want to know that the price that I am paying is not significantly higher than I could pay for the same item elsewhere. On the rare occasion when I do overpay for an item, I tend to feel foolish and cheated after learning that I could have paid significantly less for the same item at another retailer.

With the advent of UPC technology, it’s now even easier to be a price conscious shopper. If an item’s price is not clearly marked, for whatever reason, it is now quite simple for any store employee to look up the price of that item. Many retailers, like Wal Mart, now allow you to look up a price yourself with bar code scanning kiosks placed around the store.

So imagine, if you will, a store that did not have any prices posted, and who made it difficult for you to find out how much something costs until after you purchased it. In fact, what would you think if that store made you pay for your purchase by credit card, and you couldn’t find out how much it cost until you received your statement in the mail, 4 to 6 weeks later? Would you shop at that store? Me neither.

Yet, this is exactly the type of behavior that we accept from the health care industry.

When we see a physician, how often are we aware of what their services cost until after we receive treatment? I am not talking co-pays here – I mean the total cost of the services, including what they are collecting from our insurance carriers (ALWAYS remember Star Trek Economics -

http://healthcarehullabalo.blogspot.com/2010/02/star-trek-economics.html


). Very often, we don’t discover this information until we receive our EOB from our insurance carrier weeks after the services have been rendered.

The problem that this creates is that we’re totally insulated from the true costs of health care. As consumers, we have no knowledge, and therefore no say, in what our health care truly costs. We can’t comparison shop between different providers. This has allowed the prices we pay for our care to spiral upwards, out of control.

I always laugh when I see health care insurance carriers extolling the fact that they are doing their part in ‘keeping health care affordable’. First of all, that’s my job – not yours. I never asked you to do that for me. Secondly, you’re doing a pretty shitty job of keeping things affordable. I would love to tell them, as the Donald is so fond of saying, “You’re Fired!”. Unfortunately, the system is stacked against me and I can’t afford to fire them (See Bizarro #2). So, like an underperforming relative that we hired to keep peace in the family, we can’t fire our health insurance company.


The situation is just as bad in the pharmacy. Here, the dichotomy between the real world and the Bizarro world is even more pronounced.

The front half of the drugstore exists in the real world. Prices are clearly marked, and they are often quite competitive with other retailers. The back of the store, however, exists in the Bizarro world. In the pharmacy department, where prescriptions are filled, no prices are posted. Ask the price of a prescription before you have it filled and you are almost guaranteed to be met by a slightly annoyed blank stare. Sometimes they’ll answer this question by saying “your Co-Pay is….” But that is not an answer to the question I asked.

Many people don’t realize that retail prices for prescription drugs do vary significantly from pharmacy to pharmacy. If you want to be a smart shopper, and you live in New Jersey, there is a web site that will allow you to price shop a drug from the various retailers in your area. Maintained by the State’s Attorney General’s Office, it’s a great resource for the comparison shopper. Even if you have insurance, please remember that, regardless of your fixed co-pay, you will eventually pay the full price in the end. Beam me up, Scotty.



The web site is : https://www6.state.nj.us/LPSCA_DRUG/search.jsp

Remarkably, prescription drug prices can vary between drugstores by as much as 25%. Just as surprising, the major chains don’t always have the best pricing. It just goes to show you how the ‘hidden price policy’ works in their favor. Drugstore chains will fight for your business by advertising that their AA batteries are 50 cents cheaper than their competitors, but it takes some sleuthing to discover that they are charging you $50 more for your bottle of Nexium.

In fact, it seems that that ubiquitous glass wall that separates the pharmacy department from the rest of the store is some kind of inter-dimensional barrier that keeps the two worlds apart. Perhaps if that wall wasn’t there, there would be some kind of matter/anti-matter explosion that would destroy all life on earth….



In the front of the store, they’re printing photos. In the back of the store, they’re printing money.

Even the workers are separated. The white coats in the pharmacy dress differently from the front-store workers in their cheery red or blue vests and aprons. I bet that they even have separate toilets – after all, the two worlds can never be allowed to collide.

So, here we azre, a nation of consumers who are acutely aware of what almost everything costs, except if our spending is health care related. In that arena, we remain placidly and mutely ignorant.

Bizarre.



***** Found this Interesting, Entertaining or Informative? Please read the complete blog at: *****
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Bizarro #3 – What’s Up Doc?

Being in the medical business, I meet and know hundreds of Doctors. I know all types of Doctors as well – Internists, Surgeons, Osteopaths, Podiatrists, Chiropractors, Dentists and Veterinarians.

They all have two things in common:

1) They all work in health care and

2) Everybody calls them ‘Doctor’



Three of my closest friends are also Doctors. I’ll keep things anonymous and just call them Dr. R, Dr. C, and Dr. G. All three, as you might surmise, are very smart fellows.

Dr. R is one of my oldest and dearest friends. He is also my personal physician. We go all the way back to the third grade. Dr. R went to a state college and then attended medical school in the Caribbean. He is a very capable clinician, and he treats many people besides me, including many friends and family members. I would recommend his services to anyone.

Dr. C and Dr G are different from Dr. R. As I said, Dr. R is a very bright guy. Dr C and Dr. G, however, are on a completely different plane – they are both brilliant – two of the smartest people I have ever had the pleasure of calling my friend.

Upon meeting them, you probably wouldn’t know that they were Doctors. They don’t fit the usual mold. Dr C looks like a mountain man and Dr. G looks like an Iowa farmhand.















But the biggest reason why you wouldn’t know these guys were Doctors is that nobody calls them Doctor.

You see, neither of them work in the health care field – they have academic PhD’s and they don’t practice medicine in any way, shape or form.

I am not belittling their educations – far from it. Dr. C received his doctorate in Organic Chemistry from a world renowned University. Dr. G received his PhD in Engineering from a top ranked engineering school (yes, Sheldon, some Engineers have their Doctorates – not everyone is like Wolowitz).















In fact, the level of their education far exceeds the level of many people who enjoy the term ‘Doctor’ in both social and professional settings.

So why do only those people with advanced degrees who work in health care enjoy the title of ‘Doctor’?

Some might argue that the coveted title of Doctor should only be applied to those who save lives. The problem with this argument is that not all medical professionals are in the position to save lives. Even physicians who do research and never see or touch a patient are honored with the title of Doctor.

Besides, this type of thinking belittles the academic and professional accomplishments of those PhDs are who work outside of medicine.

Dr C is a world-recognized contributor in the field of wind turbine technologies. Dr. G invents new materials – materials that replace our dwindling supply of natural resources. Forget about saving patients – these guys are helping save the planet. How many Doctors in the health care field can match that claim?

In spite of all this, Dr. C and Dr. G are only called Doctor when they deliver a lecture or write a research paper. Meanwhile, the guy who squeezes my dog’s anal glands insists that everybody calls him ‘Doctor’.





Bizarre.



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Bizarro #2 – The King is Dead

While composing my points on Bizarro #2, I recalled a story told to me by my friend Scottie, and how he was able to eat dinner with his family one special night.
Scottie is one of the nicest people you could ever meet, He lives with his wife and children out on Long Island, and he works in lower Manhattan on Wall Street. Scottie commutes on the Long Island Railroad, which connects to the New York City Subway. This is an easy commute, and it allows Scottie to get home at a decent hour and have dinner with his wife and kids.

This commuting arrangement worked well for Scottie, until one Tuesday morning, when he realized that he might not be able to have dinner at home that evening.
You see, that Tuesday morning, a few blocks away from where Scottie worked, two airliners crashed into the World Trade Center.



September 11, 2001 was not a day to be in Manhattan, especially not in the downtown area. Chaos was the norm that day, as you might imagine. All public transportation has shut down. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers had to walk home that day, many wearing business suits and uncomfortable dress shoes.

Not Scottie.

Scottie found someone with a car, a stranger no less, and that stranger drove Scottie back to Long Island, where he was back in plenty of time to eat dinner as usual, with his family.

How did Scottie accomplish this? How did he persuade this stranger to drive him all the way back to Long Island?

Actually, this was quite easy.

Scottie simply traded with the stranger, exchanging the car ride for miniature monochromatic portraits of dead patriots. In fact, Scottie gave this stranger a matched set of 5 portraits that looked just like this:



The moral of this story is simple: Cash is King.

On 9/11/2001, hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers had to walk all the way home. Their Visa Debit Cards, their Mastercards, and their insurance cards were useless to them on that awful day.

Literally, on 9/11/2001, Cash talked and everybody else walked.



Which brings me, in a Paul Harvey kind of way, to the rest of the story…

Bizarro #2 – The King is Dead

In the world of health care, Cash is dead. Well, maybe not 100% dead, but it certainly is not doing very well. In the world of health care, if you are paying cash, you are heavily penalized for doing so. And it is in no way a small penalty – in some instances, cash patients can pay almost twice as much as those who pay through their insurance companies.

This is so important to the whole health care problem, so pivotal, and so bizarre, let us not glance this over. In fact, I’ll repeat myself. So here, in parentheses, capital letters, quotated, read the following words:

(“CASH PATIENTS CAN PAY ALMOST TWICE AS MUCH AS THOSE WHO PAY THROUGH THEIR INSURANCE COMPANIES”)

(Thanks, Arlo)

It’s like this – medical offices sign contracts with insurance companies so that they can be “in network”. Part of these contracts stipulate that the office agrees to lower rates for services billed to the carrier. But the contracts also stipulate that the office cannot offer discounted rates to other non-contracted (non-insurance company) entities. If the office violates this agreement, they face severe penalties, financial and other.

The modern medical office is the only place on the face of the planet where paying in cash causes you a distinct major, disadvantage.

Bizarre. Heck, even Exxon gives you a discount for paying cash.



Think about the logistics of it all. Consider an office procedure that costs $500.00. An insurance company might have negotiated a rate of $260.00 for that procedure, and that’s what they (and their members) pay for it. For that $260.00, the office needs to employ people to take down the patient’s insurance information, fill out forms, and submit the claim to the carrier. Often they pay a third party company (or clearing house) to process the claim electronically. Often the carrier will reject a claim, and the office will need to figure out why the claim was rejected, fix it, and then resubmit it. Carriers often ‘misplace claims, so offices need to be diligent and track open claims and then follow up on ones that the carrier ‘lost’. All of this effort takes manpower – manpower that has to get paid a salary, and needs a place to work.

With a lot of effort, and a little luck, the office will collect their $260.00 4 to 6 weeks after the services were rendered.

Contrast this with someone paying for the same visit out of pocket. At the end of the visit, they’re handing the office a credit card or a check that the office can deposit that day – no further collection efforts are needed. As much time as this saves the office, the office will collect the full $500.00 fee from them – no exceptions. Because of the possible repercussions of accepting a discounted fee, the office most likely won’t even discuss the possibility with you (after all, you could be a ‘plant’ from an insurance company who is trying the catch them giving a discount).

Even if Scottie walked in and offered to pay in greenbacks, they still couldn’t offer him a discount. He could explain to them that they could even just put the bills in their pocket, and not tell the IRS, the doctor’s ex-wife, or anyone else about the cash, but his plea would fall on deaf ears – if you are a cash patient, there is no soup (or discount) for you.




Lots of astute business people offer discounts – often substantial ones – when you pay in cash. Only in the world of health care are you penalized for it.

Bizarro.

***** Found this Interesting, Entertaining or Informative? Please read the complete blog at: *****
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Who are you? Do you agree with me, disagree with me, or have another perspective to share?

PLEASE put your 2 cents in by leaving a comment or email me at HealthcareBlog@SystematixOnline.com



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