Beware of Hospital Parking Facilities

What is it with hospital parking? Everyone complains--the patients, staff, physicians. Generally, it seems like a case of not enough spots for way too many people. In medical school I lived so close to the hospital that I never had to worry about parking. But that did not stop me from having my share of encounter with cars nearly running me over as I walked through parking areas, or near accidents caused by physicians racing out of the MD lot that was near the street I lived on.

Many of the patterns I observed there continue at my new institution. Only now I have to drive and am entitled to park in one of those "MD/staff only" parking areas. Being in the field that I am in where we do not do morning rounds, I get to arrive a bit later in the morning than many of my fellow residents. Thus, I get there around the time that tired people are leaving after working overnight and as many of the attendings are arriving.

Can I just say sleep deprivation, luxury cars with big engines, and arrogance are a really bad mixture? In the past week I have seen cars weaving towards the exit with the telltale open window of a sleepy driver, and been nearly read-ended multiple times by Lexus/Audi/BMW/Mercedes racing up behind me on the ramps in the mad dash for spots. In one case I looked in my rear view mirror and saw the driver making obscene gestures at me since I was apparently not driving fast enough in a narrow aisle with a 5 mph speed limit. I was very surprised he did not honk. But I was not surprised when I later caught a glimpse of his badge as we walked into the hospital. I'll leave his department to your imagination.

The moral of the story is drive very defensively when you go to a teaching hospital, especially if it is around shift change.