Drowning In Today’s Healthcare System
I have been going to the same doctor for the past fifteen plus years and he has been a dream come true for me personally. He is a general MD and has treated my entire family as well.
As it worked out we started seeing him when he started practicing at a clinic near our home and we were some of his first patients.
All these years later he is mostly overbooked and you can only get into see him (if you are an established patient) after a couple weeks. He is not taking new patients anymore and he is extremely busy at all times.
It used to be that he would actually call me himself to see how a certain problem was going and even at the time I thought “Wow” when I received those calls.
Now when I call his office I get his nurse and she gives him messages and then calls me back; which is okay most of the time but sometimes it can be quite frustrating because you cannot really communicate ideas through another party.
The last time I was in his office I looked at him and said, “Well, I guess we can no longer talk to you when we call in.”
He stood up and came and looked me in the eyes and said, “If you ask a question it will be translated to me but if you say ‘I want to speak to Dr. J’ then I will call you.
I will always call my patients.” Which was really great to hear and it was so comforting the way he responded to me.
However the same cannot be said about my mother who is on Medicare and has trouble even getting her doctor to see her.
It is not just the elderly either or those on Medicare that are having doctor problems because I have just gone through another stupefying ordeal with my son who is in fact twenty-one and still on our insurance.
He was recently playing touch football and upon catching a ball and turning the wrong way heard a popping sound and felt intense pain.
Being a strong male, like many males I have known, he refused to go to the doctor the first day and used ice and moaned. I talked him into going to the urgent care the next day because it was the weekend.
The pain finally got the best of him and away we went. They did x-rays and saw a small chip and possibly a hairline fracture but they were not radiologists and told us to follow up with an orthopedic doctor.
They put him on crutches and wrapped his leg and told him to stay off of it.
We called Monday and got in to see an orthopedic on Tuesday which I was actually surprised about but then when someone is in pain you would think it may speed up the process.
They looked at the x-rays and then had to take their own and told him they saw nothing and to walk on the leg and if in two weeks he was still in pain to come back and they would x-ray again to see if the bones spread apart in the calf.
It was the smaller bone that appeared to have the fracture but they said they did not see anything. They thought perhaps it was the ligaments or tendons that were torn.
This was about a week and a half before Thanksgiving when this all took place. He was limping around and wincing in pain most of the time and during the night it was even worse. On Thanksgiving Day he was visiting a friend’s house and as he was leaving he took a couple steps backwards and fell over a decorative brick and heard a familiar popping sound.
We went back to the urgent care and got x-rays yet again and this time the small bone in the calf was snapped in two. They put us in a stabilizing cast and sent him on his way again with crutches and told us to go back to the orthopedic doctor. I debated on going to the same doctor but then I decided to go because I did not want to start over with a new doctor and I really wanted to ask them what in the world happened.
That morning, just by chance, I got a call from the urgent care radiologist who looked at the first x-rays from two weeks ago and he told me there was a hairline fracture!
At this point I was really agitated, not only was my son in pain but we were paying double money and he was missing school and I had to make sure someone was with my mother as well when we were away from home. We made our way back to the orthopedic doctor and upon coming into the room we were waiting in (after about an hour and a half) he said something like, “Well, you would think this was my first rodeo!” As I am telling you all this you are probably wondering where we live, maybe some podunk town in the middle of nowhere, nope not at all. We live in one of the major metropolitan areas in the United States.
After seeing the x-rays he felt around on his leg and hit a particularly sore area in the ankle and then asked for more x-rays. At that point he was concerned about ligament damage again and upon looking at the x-rays said that he did not see anything but just to be sure he wanted us to go to an even more special specialist.
A doctor that just dealt with ankles, feet, and calves! I suppose he was covering himself and did not want to make any further mistakes, I really do not know. I was upset about the whole ordeal but really did not know if I should make it a bigger deal or leave it alone. I am exhausted with the medical profession at present.
Author Bio: Rachel is a graduate from Iowa State University and an ex-babysitting pro as well as a professional writer and blogger.
