My mom was not too happy to be there. Last time a chair gave way on her in the ER and she fell. They took x-rays and sent her home. Turns out they missed two  pelvic fractures. But that's another story.

Never mind the six hour wait in the ER. Standard practice, it seems. At least this time they got the diagnosis right.. Told him they were going to admit him and insert a few pins and a plate, and - voila - he'd be good as new. So there he was, awaiting surgery, when I first encountered him.

Room wasn't bad. Newly built tower. The other patient in the room had no visitors and was pretty quiet. Not my dad. He complains about everthing. The room's too hot. Too cold. Not enough light. Too bright. Too noisy. He's hungry. He's constipated. And, of course, my mom - bless her heart - jumps to his every demand. Can't hear a thing, though. Deaf as can be. And I, of course, being the doctor in the family...nothing goes by without my concurrence. This, naturally, makes the hospital staff extremely nervous. Talk about a rock and a hard place.

The resident came by first. Tried to explain the procedure. My mom heard every other paragraph. My dad was kind of out of it. My job was to translate into understandable English.

"Mind if I examine you?"

"Go ahead," said my dad.

The first thing he did was grab the right leg firmly and give it a twist. My dad let loose with a blood-curdling yell that brought the charge nurse charging.

"Must be a little sore," said Dr. Mathews sheepishly. Duh. Nine years of medical school and residency. My dad picked a few choice words out of his colorful repertoire. We all pretended not to listen. My mom didn't have to pretend.

Next, he started with the "neurological."

"What day is this?"

"I dunno. Sunday?" (It was Monday).

"Can you feel this?" (He stuck a pin in my dad's right great toe).

"Nope."

"How about this?" (Left side this time).

Uh-uh."

"Now, wiggle your toes on your right foot."

No response.

"Now the left side."

Nothing.

"OK. Now I'm going to listen to your chest."

My dad cooperated by coughing up a boatload of "phlegm," capping it off with a few explosive, well-directed wet sneezes for good measure. As he took deep breaths, I could hear the rales across the room.

"Everything seems fine. We'll take a few blood tests just to be sure, but we'll plan on surgery tomorrow morning."

Somehow my dad survived this assault. Crusty old coot. We should all have his grit and moxie. But sometimes you wonder how the average patient makes it through the typical hospitalization. I should know. Spent 30 years in the health care arena. I've seen it all. The following is a short and woefully incomplete list of my favorite "hospital horror tales."

Let's start with the bed. No one knows what all those buttons and levers do. No one. Seen many a patient catapulted out of bed. And always in direct proportion to the length of the incision or the weight of the cast. And then there is the nurse call button. Whoever invented this wonder of medical science should be shot on sight. A cow bell would work better. At least no one could say they "didn't see the call light."

Another of my favorites is the visit from the lab phlebotomist to "draw some blood." Five needle sticks and a collapsed vein later you find yourself minus a unit of blood. A few days of this and the medical staff starts to work you up for "occult blood loss." Naturally, the first thing they do is "draw some blood" for tests.

The number one pet peeve, of course, is the food. You have your "liquid diet," "soft diet,"low salt diet," and, of course, the dreaded "low salt, low fat diet." Translate "no taste whatsoever diet." Not that anything else tastes any better. After all, hospital food didn't get its reputation by tatsing good. And, to make it worse, you have to be lucky to get any food to eat at all. If, heaven forbid, you're napping or "in the can" when "nutrition services" arrives with the tray cart, they pass you right by. Forget about it. There's no such thing as a waiter to get your dinner later. Of course, they always do have that tasty "chipped ice."

The opposite of the hospital food scam is that sneaky "NPO" order (nothing per os; i.e., nothing by mouth). Hospitals are very fond of pulling this on you. Before surgery, of course, but it seems also before just about any lab test or procedure, which is always conveniently scheduled for the afternoon so you go 16 hours without eating. And, somehow, this is always combined with a missed meal the night before resulting in a 24-hour fast. Now, there is nothing like a nasty case of hemorrhoids, a 24-hour fast and a phlebotomist-induced anemia to bring out the best in all of us. But surprisingly, as nauseous, dizzy and disoriented as we may feel, it is not us but the receptionist who is rude and nasty.

"Fill this out and take a seat," she barks, never even lifting her eyes, while the "boyfriend" sneers at you in the background. Never mind that you have dutifully filled out your medical history a hundred times; you do it anyway.

"We'll call you," she snickers, as she takes a big bite out of that juicy pastry and slurps some Starbucks coffee, which by this time smells like the Ritz  to you. You take your seat and wait. Of course, they take everyone who has come in after you first. This you try to ignore, because your head feels like it's going to implode any minute now, but when you observe several of the techs behind the counter sipping coffee and joking about the last Oriole's loss (and you are an Oriole's fan) you can't take it any longer.

"Do you think it will be much longer," you ask Ms. pastry lady, struggling to keep from blacking out or woofing cookies on the counter.

"We're kind of short-staffed today; we'll call you as soon as we can," she laughs. The boyfriend sneers at you. You take your seat again, muttering under your breath, just as that wave of nausea and flush of heat hits you. Your heart is pounding in your chest. You know you will pass out soon if you can't get something to eat. Even that barium you will swallow soon is beginning to sound tasty. All you can think about is getting that GI series and that sigmoidoscopy (whatever that is, you think) over with so you can crawl back to your comfy bed and eat some of that suddenly wonderful hospital food.

Finally, your moment arrives. You are escorted back into the room, unceremoniously deposited on that cold, hard table and told to wait until "the doctor arrives."

After another intolerable delay, a cute little thing in whites arrives, with an enormous, flexible tube in tow, which she deposits proudly in plain view in front of you. She proceeds to move you onto your right side, while expertly placing your knees so as to provide the "maximum exposure," your butt waving in the breeze.

"You'll feel a little pressure now," she coos seductively. Your eyes suddenly get very wide as the truth begins to creep into your dimmed conscience.