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wendy

Since we already killed another thread with this...

Dude, I love you but with that sort of overreaction, I can imagine how you feel dismissed since most doctors won't ever react in an alarmist fashion to keep a patient calm even if a situation is serious. The last thing they want to do is spin someone up about an issue unnecessarily.  

For most people, Endo (and IBS) are a matter of comfort. Both suck, absolutely (and I've actually gotten a preliminary diagnosis of both myself so I'm really not calling this fibromyalgia here), but I'm not concerned that my life is in danger here if I don't take BCP.

Now I am at an office where I can respond in a way that is not limited to my poor iphone typing skills.

And I am bringing it back up because going back reading I can understand that what I said could be interpreted as being overreactive or expecting to be coddled. And, I don't expect overraction or a feeling that my diseases may kill me. I just want the right amount of care and someone who actually listens, hears me and treats me accordingly.

And this is unrelated to the Catholic thing. I think there is unfortunately a lot of inadequate care that comes from some doctors due to constraints by insurance companies, practice policies, etc. My last PCP would spend an hour with you on her initial consultation and close to that at each annual appointment, going over your case history and really providing that quality of care that I feel everyone deserves. But then I lost that doc because her practice became that COnsierge Care or whatever they call it now where you have to pay an additional multithousand dollar fee that is not covered by insurance.

 

When I say being dismissed it is situations like this:

1. On initial diagnosis: I was told by one ob that cramps just hurt. When I got to the right ob, the diagnosis was made of endo and they found tissue in a lap and removed it. Had I just accepted that cramps hurt, my endo could have gone more advanced and caused damaged. 

2. After being diagnosed with something like IBS or endo, if there is a situation where you feel that something is wrong in that area beyond that you may be ignored. For instance, my mom has a history of bowel issues just like I do. She got sicker two years ago and got hospitalized and for days they just treated her as though it was her diverticulitis combined with stomach bug. Turns out it was a perforation in her intestine forming. She would have died within a couple of hours had they not immediately done surgery.

So, what I mean is not that I expect for someone to treat endo or IBS like it is life threatening, but that I expect doctors to listen to patients and really take the time to ensure that they are meeting their medical needs. Does that make me difficult? I don't know. I think it is sad to think that it would. Has standard of care dropped that low?

 

Re: wendy

  • For what it's worth, I absolutely agree that most doctors spend far too little time with patients and are quick to jump to the most likely cause/effect scenario rather than digging into each situation individually. 

    On the flip-side, I can't blame them sometimes given the number of armchair physicians thanks to google who come in telling the doctor what is wrong with them and what treatment they need these days. And people do tend to freak the eff out about things that ultimately aren't THAT BAD. 

  • imageWendyToo:

    On the flip-side, I can't blame them sometimes given the number of armchair physicians thanks to google who come in telling the doctor what is wrong with them and what treatment they need these days. And people do tend to freak the eff out about things that ultimately aren't THAT BAD. 

    I can totally agree that this has to be a frustration in medical practice. And I am sure it is hard for doctors to determine which patient is armchair diagnosing versus really ill. 

    However, the downside to ignoring real symptoms is that someone gets sick. And there are doctors who have become jaded.

  • I didn't think I would respond here but it brings me back to my dad's illness. For about six months he had stomach pains every time he ate. He went to a gastro doctor he's known for years a number of times and each time the doctor dismissed it as being something very minor, but he never got better and was losing weight. I still don't know why that doctor never took him more seriously when the pain would not subside for months. We all know what happened - turns out pancreatic cancer causes stomach pains. By the time they diagnosed it, there was nothing to do but get his affairs in order. Of course it's quite possible that he would have died from it anyway, even had it been discovered earlier (sadly, cure rates are very low for pancreatic cancer), but maybe he would have had a fighting chance. I don't blame a doctor for dismissing pains as being minor - after all if you see hoof prints, it's most likely horse, not zebra. But the issue comes in when an issue does not subside after a significant period of time and a doctor continues to tell you it's still a damn horse.
    image Mabel the Loser.
  • imageNovemberrocks:
    I didn't think I would respond here but it brings me back to my dad's illness. For about six months he had stomach pains every time he ate. He went to a gastro doctor he's known for years a number of times and each time the doctor dismissed it as being something very minor, but he never got better and was losing weight. I still don't know why that doctor never took him more seriously when the pain would not subside for months. We all know what happened - turns out pancreatic cancer causes stomach pains. By the time they diagnosed it, there was nothing to do but get his affairs in order. Of course it's quite possible that he would have died from it anyway, even had it been discovered earlier (sadly, cure rates are very low for pancreatic cancer), but maybe he would have had a fighting chance. I don't blame a doctor for dismissing pains as being minor - after all if you see hoof prints, it's most likely horse, not zebra. But the issue comes in when an issue does not subside after a significant period of time and a doctor continues to tell you it's still a damn horse.

    I will now be googling pancreatic cancer to see if that is the cause of my stomach pains.

    also, I would have thought horses and zebras would have very similar hoof prints, no?

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  • oh november, it just makes me so sad. I hear you.
  • imagemashedpotato:

    imageNovemberrocks:
    .

    I will now be googling pancreatic cancer to see if that is the cause of my stomach pains.

    also, I would have thought horses and zebras would have very similar hoof prints, no?

    Yeah, my ex's dad (who was a doctor) always used that saying to mean that if you see something that looks like horse prints, chances are that's what it is.  i.e., the simplest and most common answer is usually correct, so don't jump to zebra until you know it's not horse.

    image Mabel the Loser.
  • I'm slow.
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  • Yep, we have the same story in our family.  Mom - overweight, her liver looks like an alcoholic's.  However, no doctor ever stopped and took a harder look because they disregarded her due to her weight as soon as she walked in the door.  They never listened to hear that she ate like a bird and that she had maybe 10 drinks in her entire life.

    She had about three weeks from diagnosis of cancer until she passed away (undiagnosed primary due to the fact that cancer was found all throughout her body once they finally discovered it...even though she already had an oncologist for "non-cancerous polyps").

    It is so frustrating when decisions are made about an individual before that person is even seen by a doctor.  Not everybody fits within the description in a text book.

    Image and video hosting by TinyPic
  • imageVinny2008:

    Yep, we have the same story in our family.  Mom - overweight, her liver looks like an alcoholic's.  However, no doctor ever stopped and took a harder look because they disregarded her due to her weight as soon as she walked in the door.  They never listened to hear that she ate like a bird and that she had maybe 10 drinks in her entire life.

    She had about three weeks from diagnosis of cancer until she passed away (undiagnosed primary due to the fact that cancer was found all throughout her body once they finally discovered it...even though she already had an oncologist for "non-cancerous polyps").

    It is so frustrating when decisions are made about an individual before that person is even seen by a doctor.  Not everybody fits within the description in a text book.

    I didn't know that Vinny.  I'm sorry. 

     And Mashed, do not, under any circumstances, google Pancreatic Cancer.  VERY BAD IDEA.

    image Mabel the Loser.
  • oh vinny, i am so sorry. My friend's mother struggles with the same stigma of being ignored by doctors due to obesity. it's heartbreaking to hear that.
  • This post blows. 

    I want to hug you guys.

  • Luckily it wasn't fatal, but I think I've talked about my sil here before. She had a benign tumor the size of a large grapefruit on her uterus. For two years she went to doctor after doctor who told her the wild hormonal changes she was having were depression and sent her to therapy. At some point she could feel the growth under her skin and two different doctors refused to even touch her to check. When she finally got to the right specialist, she found it in 5 minutes. The whole thing makes me infuriated to even think about it. 
    image

    "The meek shall inherit the earth" isn't about children. It's about deer. We're all going to get messed the fuckup by a bunch of cloned super-deer.- samfish2bcrab

    Sometimes I wonder if scientists have never seen a sci-fi movie before. "Oh yes, let's create a super species of deer. NOTHING COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG." I wonder if State Farm offers a Zombie Deer Attack policy. -CaliopeSpidrman
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