Because the hoops I'm being expected to jump through to appease the stupid health center so they will clear me for a surgery that is supposed to happen in a week might make you think I'm taking part in one of those lion taming circus acts.
Despite the fact that I have had 22 surgeries, 21 with general anesthesia which they'll be using for my shoulder scope, and the only problem I have had during or after any of those 21 general anesthesia surgeries involved a brain bleed that no amount of clearance preparation could have prevented, I still have to be seen by a neurologist to make sure they don't think my seizures will be a problem...even though this person will never have seen me before and I've had TWENTY TWO SURGERIES without a seizure during or afterwards. And I also have to be seen by a freaking endocrinologist of all things because some thyroid hormone is off in my bloodwork. Because that has a whole hell of a lot to do with my shoulder. And there's a bunch of other stuff that was off in my bloodwork that nobody in the hospital bothered to tell me when I was there!
The miracle is that the head of health care at the student health center managed to get me squeezed in for a thyroid appointment on Wednesday, and she's trying to find me a neurologist to get clearance from them. Since the original guy I saw on the 1st told the hospital when I was admitted that I should be seen by someone else since he is not an epilepsy specialist, then the doctor the hospital referred me to doesn't take my insurance, and the doctor THEY sent me to has been on vacation for more than two weeks and the receptionist yelled at me and told me she had my number and would call me when they could make an appointment and not to call back. So basically I can't get cleared because doctors refuse to see me. Which is not my fault.
Because apparently me knowing my medical history by heart, and telling them I have never had an anesthesia problem, a seizure during or post surgery, and them redoing bloodwork isn't enough for them. This is absolutely ridiculous for a freaking shoulder scope. I MIGHT understand it if I were having brain surgery or something. And I wouldn't be so frustrated if it was just about redoing bloodwork because that will only take a couple days, and if that were it I could still get clearance in plenty of time before surgery, but no, I have to have stupid specialist appointments for a surgery that is almost identical to the surgeries I had on each of my knees in which I NEVER HAD A PROBLEM.
They told me to still go to my anesthesiologist appointment tomorrow, and I'm to call the head of health care while I'm there so she can talk to the anesthesiologist, so I seriously hope that I can get this person on my side, because if I have to deal with one more doctor acting like they know me better than I do and standing in the way of SUCH a simple surgery, I may end up doing a whole lot more than the sobbing I did today in the clinic.
I NEED to have this surgery done ASAP so I can have full use of my arm in time to get the 75 pages of writing I have due in the beginning of December. Plus, I simply can't go on in this much pain since the orthopedic guy I started out seeing thinks I'm a drug addict and refuses to give me more pain meds, and I also can't keep going on much longer without real use of the one good arm that I have.
I don't know if you can tell, but doctors aggravate the hell out of me.
No comments:
Post a Comment