Friday, June 30, 2006

Pump Me Up

I went to see a neurologist yesterday. This is the 1st time I've seen a Neurologist since I had my Thymectomy. I finally got my ass to one and now I dont know how I feel.

On one hand Im happy tht she seems to know about Myasthenia Gravis and has treated other patients with it before, and seems quick to act. On the other hand hs is rather frightening...

1st the experience in the office was already not so great. I was told to come in 30 minutes before my scheduled time of 930 am, in order to fill out paperwork. I arrived at 850they didnt give me the paperwork until 940 and then called me in 2 minutes later. But of course I wasnt done with the paperwork since I just got it. By that time I was the only one left in the waiting room.

Then I am finally called in to the Dr's office, where again, I have to sit and wait for her. She Bursts in with her head in her notes and gruffly barks "I dont have your charts, your history I have nothing, I cant do anything I need your medical history"

At this point Im a little shocked and say .. slightly annoyed...

"Hello ... ? ...?"

and she gave no answer, just sat down with a certain amoutn of force assertation of authority. "I cant do anything without your medical records, Do you have a number so we can contact your previous doctor"

Me: "Um... I gave this to the receptionist... 2 weeks ago when making the apointment" ( I even gave the fax number and specifically asked if they needed my records)

She huffs and storms out... then comes back in "They the dont have it" as if this is my fault, are they just attempting to obtain this info NOW?

So she sets that aside from her mind and moves on. She proceeds to bombard me with the the usual questions and even tells me bluntly that my eyes look bad and then barks out that she thinks my last neurologist was not aggressice enough

She starts barking out 4 different EKGs, EMG, EEG, TCD, brain scan, blood work, steroids, IV flush that she isnt sure if she can get insurance to pay for, that I will be on for 4 days... blurting all this out in rapidfire like a machine gun never once stopping to breathe...

WOW!!! wait... "Hi ... my name is Mike"

No time for that though, lets just pump you full of steriods

And then I ask about eyelid surgery. then she finally pauses, without looking at me. She huffs out... "thats not going to do anything, thats just cosmetic"

Woooooo... Lady, try covering half your eyeball with your eyelids for just ONE FREAKING day and then tell me "its just cosmetic" It covers half my freakin eyeballand distortts my vision, and when I manually lift them the double vision goes away!

You are more than willing to pump me with steriods, hook some IV thingy up to me for days and give me all these immunosuppresants but wont even consider the eyelide surgery... which within less than 1 yr would cost less and have far less side effects than the steriods alone

I'll go through with the 6 or 8 tests that she rushed me into, that seems more than logical. But I will have to talk to her again about the eyelids. It seems logical that she would understand esp especially since she herself seemed to recognize that the disease is mainly concentrated in the eyelid area and not so much in the rest of my body

but lets just pump me up full of drugs...

maybe it will work, Initial 1st impressions and bitching aside. I'll set my mind to this plan and hope it works

1 comment:

Ryan said...

I'm sorry that you had to experience such apathy and lack of care from your doctor's office. Tragic.

I hope you receive better care next time.

Happy 4th.