LafayetteLady
Posts: 7683
Joined: 5/2/2007 From: Northern New Jersey Status: offline
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BadOne, I'm glad to hear you are feeling better. I would miss your caustic wit if you were suddenly gone. beth's statement is so dead on. Don't BLINDLY follow your doctor. I've never understood why people don't ask questions about what their doctor tells them. I even have particular friends that I will take with me to important appointments in case my anxiety gets out of control or I'm going to receive any narcotics or anethesia. The friends who I know will ask the questions on my behalf. Years ago, I went to the ER because I had broken my toe. For me a broken toe seems to occur almost as frequently as a broken nail, being so graceful and having impeccable vision and depth perception, lol. This time though the pain was shooting up the bottom of my foot. Anyway, x-rays are taken and in comes the doctor. He looks like he just came in from a three day bender of bar hopping. Holds the x-ray up, says "yep, it's broken" and starts walking out the door. Until I stopped him, told him I already KNEW it was broken, but there was the pain up the bottom of my foot. Sure enough, the break, being on my middle toe (that was an especially graceful event), had traveled a bit and that was causing the pain. Now of course from the moment I entered the ER, I was asked by every single person that I spoke to what I was allergic to. I repeated penicillin and codeine more times than I could count. The doctor leaves and in walks the nurse with a little cup containing two pills. "What are they?" I ask despite her dirty look at the question. "Tylenol 4" she responds as she pushes the cup my way. "I don't think so" I retort as I push the cup back at her and then go on to explain that I have told at least 6 people, including her that I'm allergic to codeine. "Well we don't have anything else here that we can give you" WTF? Then I guess you will have to write a prescription because I'm not taking it. The next day I called the Head of the Emergency Department and told him what happened. I also told him that while I was very distressed over the behavior and the doctor, I was more concerned because so many people would have just taken what was handed to them thinking they had stated their allergies (several times) and the results could have been disasterous. He was very nice. He apologized, the doctor and the nurse were both reprimanded and sent for some kind of counseling. The big surprise? He wiped out the bill. I recently changed primary doctors. I really like my new one. He will explain everything, answer all questions and the really important thing? When I ask him about something that he doesn't know because it isn't his area of expertise (such as my recent ankle surgery)? He admits that he doesn't know. I think that far too many people think that because their doctor or lawyer or other professional supposedly spent tons of money on their education, they MUST know. They don't know everything, they will make mistakes, not typically intentional, but it happens. Most don't like to be reminded that they technically are employed by their patients to provide a service, but really they are. I own my own PDR and will always look up the drugs I'm taking (which these days are pretty plentiful). I also always use the same pharmacy except if I am coming from the ER and need to use the 24 hour CVS. So my pharmacist knows me, they go out of their way to be helpful when my insurance is being a pain in the ass (which is often) and will even let me know when my refills will require ordering and take more time so that I can plan accordingly. Taking an active role in your own healthcare is simply common sense.
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