Court sessions and scalpels don’t mix.
Far be it for your humble BP correspondent to cast aspersions on the professionalism of others, but we confess the following report did send an eyebrow arching skywards in a quizzical manner.
For better or worse, COVID has made technologies such as Zoom a big part of many people’s lives – perhaps too big a part, in some cases.
Take, for example, a plastic surgeon based in California called Scott Green.
Dr Green managed to get himself into a spot of bother with the Smokies, resulting a traffic violation which he was prepared to contest via a Zoom call with the local court.
So far, so normal. Except when our intrepid surgeon logged into the call, it quickly became clear he was not sitting in his home office with a cat on his lap (nor on his face).
Instead, he was in an operating theatre and in the process of performing surgery on an unconscious patient.
The delightfully named newspaper The Sacramento Bee obtained footage of the call and we shall quote directly from its report.
“Hello, Mr Green? Are you available for trial?” a courtroom clerk asked. “It kind of looks like you’re in an operating room right now?”
“I am, sir,” Green said. “Yes, I’m in an operating room right now. I’m available for trial. Go right ahead.”
Dr Green is clearly no shrinking violet when it comes to assessing his own ability to multi-task.
But the judge in the case was not overly impressed and postponed the hearing due to holding a greater concern for the safety of the patient than the bloke holding the sharp knife.
The Medical Board of California is now looking into the incident.
We do hope our surgeon is prepared to commit a touch more of his attention span to that particular investigation.
If you see something stupid, say something stupid … please give your undivided attention to felicity@medicalrepublic.com.au.
