The other day, I made a mistake at work.

It was the end of a long day. I had already run an outpatient cancer clinic with dozens of unwell patients and then moved on to inpatient rounds on a busy medical unit.

My small team cares for 30 patients aged 25 to 100.

The younger ones often live with disability and mental illness. Elderly people present with falls, organ failure and dementia. The diagnoses are common, but the stories are distinct.

People have tripped, taken too many pills, or have “no idea what happened”. Some are delirious and dying, though no one has quite said it aloud. Others report pain. A few are homeless. Nearly everyone has undergone a battery of tests – many of them unnecessary.

The carer of a disabled young man finds me to tell me gently but firmly that he’s in pain.

“I believe you,” I reply, scrambling to prescribe analgesia. Thank goodness for carers.

Another patient is agitated after weeks in hospital. Each day we try something new with no result. I make a mental note to call his wife.

Elsewhere, a patient with dementia has been effectively evicted from her nursing home for periodic aggression. Everyone agrees this is wrong, but the responsibility for advocacy falls, once again, to the medical team. She will languish here.

A tidy ward round requires clearing the mind between patients. But when the........

© The Guardian