Probably still is. How did I find out? The nurse in question told him why she quit working for me. Said she was uncomfortable with the language I used in the OR, and the unorthodox methods I employed, like yelling, pushing, and slapping the kids around on my operating table when they failed to respond. This guy filed a complaint with the board, and I had to answer for it by agreeing to attend a series of sensitivity lectures.

I fully intend to punish him for that.

You probably think I should tell his fiancée he’s been cheating on her with my former nurse, but if confronted, he’ll deny it and claim I fabricated the story to get back at him for reporting my inappropriate behavior. He’d wind up an even bigger hero in her eyes.

So that won’t work.

But trust me. I’ll find a perfect way to get back at him. Don’t worry, I’ll make you proud.

Speaking of proud, just look at the way his fiancée is beaming! She’s proud of her young doctor, in his scrubs, fresh from the hospital, where he’s been working alongside dedicated nurses, doctors, and highly-skilled, highly-trained personnel. By this time next year he’ll be married, in private practice, earning enough to subsidize his wife’s jewelry fetish.

He doesn’t have to wear scrubs. I mean, who wears scrubs to a fancy engagement party?

This guy.

And the reason why is because he wants the whole world to know he’s a doctor. It’s a status symbol.

You see them everywhere, don’t you? Nurses and doctors wearing scrubs in grocery stores, fast food restaurants, coffee shops, at their kids’ ball games, at PTA meetings.

I don’t wear scrubs in public. Want to know why?

If you strip the scrubs off the next ten nurses, doctors, or health workers you see in public today and send them to a lab, six will test positive for pathogenic bacteria that can cause pneumonia and lethal bloodstream infections. One of the ten scrubs will test positive for antibiotic-resistant organisms, which can kill you even if you’re in an ICU, receiving round-the-clock medical treatment.

Highest areas of concern? Sleeves, waists, and pockets.

How do you think our cute brunette would feel if she knew that when her fiancé gave her a full-body embrace a moment ago he saturated her blouse and jeans with live germs that could render her unable to have children?

There they stand, chatting up the bartender, holding hands, grinning like pigs in shit.

Now he’s reaching in his pocket, removing cash, placing it in the bartender’s tip jar.

Now he’s holding his fiancé’s hand again.

It’s highly likely his pocket contains live viruses he brought with him from the hospital, not to mention each bill in his pocket is saturated with up to 25,000 colony-forming germ units. To put it another way, the folding money in his pocket contains more bacteria per square centimeter than the steaming shit stack the homeless wino deposits behind our hospital loading dock every night.

Think about it. A butcher handles raw meat all day and gives his assistant a five-dollar bill to bring him a sandwich. The assistant gives the bill to the sandwich shop lady, who gives it to the next customer in change, who swings by the coffee shop on his way home from work. Everyone who handled that five-dollar bill has been exposed to what amounts to germ warfare, and our young doctor will accept that same bill, fold it, place it in his germ-infested pocket, cross-contaminate his hands with the live viruses and germs picked up in the hospital, and spread it to his fiancé’s hand (and her crotch, if he happens to get lucky after the luncheon).

Where you see a romantic gesture, I see a possible homicide.

I know what you’re thinking.

You think I’m exaggerating because health care workers kill hospital germs by washing their hands.

Think again.

Tests show 33 to 50% of all health care workers fail to achieve minimal hygiene standards when washing their hands.

Every time.

Even when they know we’re conducting tests.

We’d all like to believe that doctors, nurses, and orderlies would understand the importance of thoroughly washing their hands after taking a shit in a hospital toilet, and yet 1.7 million health care associated infections (HAI’s) take place in US hospitals every year and kill more than 100,000 patients.

Yes, I realize I just said that U.S. hospitals kill 100,000 patients each and every year! You check in with a broken leg and check out in a body bag.

Why can’t we make health care workers wash their hands properly?

Who’s going to enforce it?

We’ve got signs posted everywhere.

Doesn’t matter.

Everyone thinks they’re already washing their hands properly, and patients keep dying. You’d need to have a trained professional shadowing every worker every minute, because it only takes one mistake by one orderly to send your Aunt Agatha into a death spiral.