Doc forgot about me!

[jadabella]

I kept getting told I wasn't old enough to get shingles. Well, you might've wanted to tell that to the case that decided to pop up on my face. I certainly could've done without it.

I had shingles when I was 9 years old. That doctor is a complete and utter idiot (but you knew that already!)

On your face, though! How awful for you. I hope you got some good care and a huge apology!

[Kristev]

A Doctor once tried to dismiss my questions and ignore every thing I said. I had my mother there, and she was an still an L. P. N., so while he ignored and dismissed me, she was able to talk to him on his own level and force him to answer my questions. It's one of the rare times she's actually been helpful to me.

[XCashier]

Not only should you report her to your state licensing board, but also report the clinic that she's associated with as they did not do a proper inspection before shutting down for the day. It only makes me wonder if she's done this to other people.

An excellent point. Someone this careless should not be practicing medicine. Report them ASAP!

A Doctor once tried to dismiss my questions and ignore every thing I said.

I hate doctors who do that. Hello, I'm the one who has to live with the condition, I'd at least like to know what the hell is going on!

[MaggieTheCat]

Besides all the recent problems I had with my annual womanly exam, I once ended up in the ER for what we eventually found out were severe gall stones. The doc told me I'd need surgery and I freaked out and started crying, and he berated me and told me "It's not a big deal, why are you crying?" Then they assumed there MUST be something wrong at home (I was living with my parents at the time) since I was having such a "severe" reaction and started questioning me about whether I felt safe at home, if I wanted them to call a women's shelter to stay at, etc.

[Pagan]

I had shingles when I was 9 years old. That doctor is a complete and utter idiot (but you knew that already!)

On your face, though! How awful for you. I hope you got some good care and a huge apology!

Oh, it wasn't the doc-in-the-box I went to telling me that. Just random people. The doc-in-the-box was concerned about the one in the corner of my eye...

No, the doc-in-the-box gave me hydrocodone 5/500 (which I found out I can't take) and overdosed me on acyclovir. Just looked at the fact that I'm an adult woman of a certain age, but didn't take into account that I'm a fairly small person.

Then they assumed there MUST be something wrong at home (I was living with my parents at the time) since I was having such a "severe" reaction and started questioning me about whether I felt safe at home, if I wanted them to call a women's shelter to stay at, etc.

I got that once at the OB/Gyn by the way I referred to the annual exam. I don't remember exactly what I said, but I meant that it's a very undignified position you wind up in.

[Sapphire Silk]

Me: Uh, did she forget about me?


I shouldn't have yelled her but I was angry. I was scared and they forgot me!!! The nurse said something about the receptionist already gone and I just stormed out of there cursing.

The freaking parking lot was empty. She must have forgotten me and went on with her patients!!! I am still livid. I cried the whole way home.

Ouch! Unbelievable. You should complain. If the doc is part of a large practice, file a written complaint with the head doc about both your doc and the nurse. Had you waited just a little longer you would have been locked in, and probably tripped an alarm when you tried to get out. Also file a complaint with the medical board. This kind of behavior is unacceptable.

Besides all the recent problems I had with my annual womanly exam, I once ended up in the ER for what we eventually found out were severe gall stones. The doc told me I'd need surgery and I freaked out and started crying, and he berated me and told me "It's not a big deal, why are you crying?" Then they assumed there MUST be something wrong at home (I was living with my parents at the time) since I was having such a "severe" reaction and started questioning me about whether I felt safe at home, if I wanted them to call a women's shelter to stay at, etc.

ANY surgery is a big deal! There are risks involved any time you invade the body.

Sometimes we medical guys get jaded, but even with that, this was an unacceptable thing to say.

[Erin]

When I was getting diagnosed with MS I had to get an MRI done.

I was home, waiting for a call about the results of the MRI. The PA from my doctor's office called me and told me I was fine. I was happy for about all of 20 minutes, because then my eye doctor called. I told him that the PA at my doctor's office had just called and told me that I was fine, that they didnt see anything on the MRI.

That was when he told me that there were three pages to the report, and that if that moron PA had read all three pages, she would have seen the radiologist's conclusion on the last page that said my results suggested that I have MS.

I was really ticked, made an official in-writing complaint to the state and also called the doctor's office kvetch about the PA and sent them an official in-writing complaint about it too.

That PA hates me now. (feeling is mutual) and I refuse to let her come near me now. She has no bedside manner and it wasnt the first time she screwed up with me. About a year before that, she told me that the numb leg/thigh that was my first MS symptom was a sprain, and a few years before that, she told me that the flaming case of mononucleosis that I had was a sinus infection and gave me antibiotics. (those specific antibiotics are not to be given to patients with mononucleosis. They cause you to get what looks like an anaphylactic reaction)

[Kristev]

That PA must be a duck. She's certainly enough of a quack.

[Eisa]

Wow. Like everyone else said...complain!

The incompetent stories remind me of this story.

My mom's a CNA at a nursing home. Idaho is full of hobo spiders. She got bit at work. The RN on duty looked at it, and you could still SEE the fang marks of the spider. So they had my mom go to urgent care immediately.

Unfortunately, the doctor on duty had had a few run-ins with the RN. So he looked at it and went "no, it's shingles." You could still see the fang marks and tell it was a spider bite!

Thankfully, it got straightened out, but boy was everyone involved pissed...to blatantly misdiagnose apparently just because you dislike the RN who came in with the patient or whatever...just wow.

She's gotten bitten 2-3 more times. One time, it seems like the hobo spider crawled up onto the bed, crawled over my dad without biting him, got to her....and bit her. She apparently exudes "bite me" signals to hobo spiders.

[KabeRinnaul]

Reminds me of one of my own. When I was in college, there was a small clinic near the campus that would see any student for just $5. Problem was, there were two doctors, a man and a woman. The woman was great, but the man, who was there far more often, seemed incapable of making a correct diagnosis.

A friend of mine went in with a sore throat and trouble breathing, which later turned out to be an allergic reaction to something she drank. He said it was strep throat.

I went in with stomach pains and nausea, which turned out to be a stomach flu. He said acid reflux.

And I went in with dry and cracked skin, and a blistered, itchy patch on my arm, which was the start of the eczema I'm still dealing with. He said it was a fungal infection, like athlete's foot, and gave me something like Lotrimin. Of course, that's meant to dry up a fungus, so it dried out my already dry skin and made the whole area much more severe.

[Pagan]

Reminds me of one of my own. When I was in college, there was a small clinic near the campus that would see any student for just $5. Problem was, there were two doctors, a man and a woman. The woman was great, but the man, who was there far more often, seemed incapable of making a correct diagnosis.

Don't get me started on the student health center at NMSU. I went in there with what turned out to be just a nasty little stomach bug. He was bound and determined that I was somehow pregnant. All we could figure is that was how he saw college girls that lived in the dorms.

Went in another time the first time I ever had a yeast infection (before the meds were OTC) and got treated to the college girl=slut thing again.

It was pretty widely known that they thought all of the students were hypochondriacs, too.

[Shalom]

And I went in with dry and cracked skin, and a blistered, itchy patch on my arm, which was the start of the eczema I'm still dealing with. He said it was a fungal infection, like athlete's foot, and gave me something like Lotrimin. Of course, that's meant to dry up a fungus, so it dried out my already dry skin and made the whole area much more severe.

Creams are drying; ointments are moisturizing. If you have a wet weepy rash, you use a cream; if you have a dry flaky rash, you use an ointment. (Many antifungals, and also antiinflammatory steroids, come both ways.) If they give you the wrong one, you can make the problem worse, as you evidently discovered.

Unfortunately not everybody knows that there's a difference. Most patients, and even some doctors, use the two terms interchangeably, which just isn't right. Worse yet is when they give me a prescription on which they just write "Flucinonide", with no further expansion. Um, doc, which one? That comes in a regular cream, an emollient cream. an ointment, a gel, a scalp solution, and a nasal spray. (OK, so it's probably not the nasal spray. Although I have seen Nasacort-AQ used to prevent skin rashes caused by allergies to adhesive.) So which one do you want to prescribe? Then I have to explain the differences, usually to the doctor's secretary, because the doctor is seeing patients and can't come to the phone just then, and she knows he's going to ask her what the difference is.

Some of these drugs even have different indications for the different forms; e.g. (one of my pet peeves) Bactroban. The ointment, which has a generic available, is used for bacterial skin infections like impetigo; the cream, which does not, is used ONLY for infected wounds. Many insurances won't pay for the cream, and when I call the doctor to have them change it, I find that they should have used the ointment in the first place.

Then you get the old-timers who ask for a "salve". That doesn't even have a legal definition anymore, as far as I know.

[Pagan]

Creams are drying; ....

THIS!! All of what you said is exactly why I trust pharmacists waaaaaay more than doctors. They're more aware of the risks of therapeutic misadventures.

[LadyAndreca]

I cannot STAND going to the health center at my college. EVERYTHING is the flu to them, unless they don't want it to be. When H1N1 was going around last year, it was quite some time before they admitted it was on campus - there were multiple confirmed cases by the time they admitted it. They didn't want to act like anyone had had the flu at ALL that year, even the normal strain.

And they're so nice and polite UNTIL they get you alone in the exam room. Then every question becomes barbed with the tone of I can't believe you didn't know that. I went in once with lower stomach pains so bad a friend of mine who'd had appendicitis bullied me into going, just in case. I got "Didn't you know you were gassy?" and "Well, since you're on your period you MUST be menstruating on that side." (WTF?) I went in with a cold and raspy voice once, and happened to mention that I wanted to get better quickly because I was a music performance/voice major and NEEDED my voice, and she spent the rest of the visit repeating it mockingly every time she told me what medications to take and how to take care of myself.

I started going to a local walk-in clinic when I couldn't wait for an appointment with my regular doctor, since I had insurance to cover it. I'm not your average eighteen-year-old freshman wanting an excuse to get out of class. I'm almost thirty, I'm -sick-, and I want to get better and get on with my life! Talking down to me and mocking me is only going to make me crankier!