Fw: Dr in North Carolina area ?

[Guest guest]

Hmmmm, I just thought a qualified physician, this case a radiologist (wherever he/she may be) can consult with your surgeon via phone, mail (send x-rays), e-mail thanks to the advances of modern communications. I never knew they had to be right smack dab in Feng's office or miles from it. Believe it or not, there are well-qualified medical professionals outside of Cleveland!!!!!

-Marie

[Guest guest]

----- Original Message ----- From: PEdw695776@...

idagirl@...

Sent: Wednesday, April 17, 2002 10:47 PM

Subject: Re: Dr in North Carolina area ?

Hi , my name is Pat , I live in Fayetteville, NC, Ft. Bragg is about 8 miles from me. I don't know where she needs a doctor to be but I am an hour from Raleigh, an hour from Wilmington and two and a half hours from Columbia.Now if she thinks that either city is close enough there is a Dr. Mark Milleer @ 910-323-1203. He is a wonderful christian man and the most compassinate doctor that Ihave ever seen and I have seen many. Iam/was a nurse but became totally disabled in 1990. We had moved from Alabama and he was referred to me when I had an acute infection in my right breast. I had to see him a good many times because themeds just would not kill the infection and my pain was so bad even before all of this and he was the first that ever told me that I MIGHT get some better but he was truthful and said it might not but I just couldn't go on like this.He really had a job to do trying to get all the scum out of my chest cavity but he did remove it all capsule and all but I didn't see any improvement for at least 7-9 monthshowever it seemed to help some but I was just too sick, I had carried those things around ruptured for about 5 years but did not have the money to get it done.This has been a horrible day, I've got ice packs all around my back and under my arms so I have to get in bed. If you need anything else, please call me. If she calls him just tell him that Pat gave you his name. My daughter also works forhim and her name is Jana Culbreth & she will be glad to answer any question.God bless and give you a good explantation.Pat Fayetteville, NC

[Guest guest]

Dear Wanda

My main purpose for keeping up with this site is to make sure women with implants that are sick get the correct information and that they are treated with respect. That means mainly that they find one of the few PS's that will remove implants en bloc that believe in our illness. To me there are tons of good PS's sure, but out of all of them how many do believe us? To me when I wanted implants removed I didn't want to be trusting some PS to operate on me who believed implants were not at the root of my problems. I still believe that most women feel that this is important. If women want to go to a PS who doesn't believe in our medical situation then that is of course their decision, but for the ones that do care and do want the special PS's who believe in us, then that is what I am here for, to help them find the correct information to lead them back to health.

I completely realize that it is an individual choice that no one can make for someone else, but it is also a choice that I made to go to a PS that had a reputation for being the best and I will continue to advise women to try to find someone who will take them seriously. When you are sick you need someone to understand and to treat you with dignity, these things are so important that they cannot be underestimated in my opinion.

I am glad that you think this site is good and that I am doing a good job, sometimes I admit I get frustrated with it all, but I am inspired by the great health gains I have made, to continue to try to help others so that they may find the health they so crave, as I have.

Blessings to you girl

----- Original Message -----

From: Wanda Simison

Sent: Wednesday, April 17, 2002 8:41 PM

Subject: Re: Fw: Dr in North Carolina area ?

I agree. Surgeons either believe that we are ill or they do not. In 1993, I relocated to another state for 18 months to get medical care because doctors here in NC did not believe that breast implants cause illness. Every surgeon I talked to here in NC wanted to replace my implants with saline. Nine years later, not much has changed although I did finally find a good rhemy in Winston Salem, NC. , you are doing a great service to women on this site. Keep up the great work! Wanda Heer wrote: Thank you for this post I feel that this group needs to he on track and that is recomending surgeons who do explant en bloc and good vertical lifts, Kolb, Huang and Feng are the ones who come to mind, they are not only good surgeons but they believe us that implants made us sick, this is most important and why I chose to moderate this site. Appreciate this post Wanda thank you so much girl!

----- Original Message -----

From: Wanda Simison

Sent: Wednesday, April 17, 2002 8:13 PM

Subject: Re: Fw: Dr in North Carolina area ? See comments below, by Dr. Stuart Bondurant, dean emeritus, UNC School of Medicine, Chapel Hill, NC. His comments are a surgeons dream. I spoke with Dr. Bondurant by phone yesterday - three years since the IOM report - he still has not changed his mind about the IOM panel's conclusions! He wouldn't budge an inch. I have made several phone calls trying to find surgeon's that do en bloc explants here in NC. So far, I haven't found anyone that I would recommend. If anyone finds a good NC surgeon, please let me know. A good friend of mine who cannot travel desperately needs an explant. Thanks! Posted on Fri, Mar. 01, 2002 The legacy of breast implants remains unresolved BY ERIC FRAZIER Knight Ridder Newspapers CHARLOTTE, N.C. - KRT NEWSFEATURES (KRT) - When Casselberry hears people dismissing the possible dangers of breast implants, she thrusts both hands out before her, palms down. "See," she says, pointing out red lesions on the backs of her hands. "I have to live with this." She blames the lesions on a silicone gel breast implant that ruptured in 1989, spilling silicone particles that migrate throughout her body. But while Casselberry and thousands of other women struggle with illnesses they blame on their implants, the public seems to have moved on. The safety of silicone gel implants, once a major public health issue, has faded from the spotlight. Plastic surgeons are doing a booming business in the saline-filled implants that replaced them. That resurgence has left Casselberry feeling frustrated and forgotten, even as she and thousands of other women continue fighting on with a 1993 class-action suit against implant maker Dow Corning. "The women involved continue to have a sense of urgency about this," said Casselberry, a Charlotte resident and licensed practical nurse. "But that doesn't seem to be shared by the court system." --- The U.S. Food and Drug Administration pulled silicone-filled implants off the general market amid controversy in 1992.Women claimed the implants, inserted under the breast tissue or behind the pectoral muscles, were rupturing and spilling silicone inside their bodies. They said they were coming down with serious illnesses, including rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia, a disease involving pain in the muscles, ligaments and tendons. After the FDA took the silicone gel implants off the general market, saline-filled ones became popular. Nationally, more than 187,000 breast augmentation surgeries were performed in 2000 - five times as many as doctors did in 1992. "Saline is safe," said Carole Rowell, administrative manager for Charlotte Plastic Surgery. "More people are saying this is what I want to do." That's a big change from the early 1990s, when controversy raged over the silicone-filled implants. Charlotte Plastic Surgery in 1991 reacted to a breast implant story airing on "Face to Face with Connie Chung" by sending a detailed letter to patients charging the report was "biased, inaccurate and inflammatory." Dr. Bullard, a Charlotte plastic surgeon who did more than 100 implant surgeries a year in the early 1990s, said he frequently used to get letters from implant patients directing him to send their medical records to lawyers. "That never happens anymore," he said. --- Women get breast implants for a variety of reasons, from simply changing their appearance to correcting a difference in breast size. Casselberry, 55, is a married mother of two who teaches medical classes at tone College of Business in the University City area. She believes women who don't ask questions about the safety of saline implants are making a mistake. She said that when she had her silicone gel implants inserted in 1979, those were said to be safe, too. She said she had them put in not for simple vanity, but as a response to years of jokes from family and friends about her small breasts. She thought they would make her feel better about herself. She did - for a while. An implant ruptured in 1989. She had both replaced. She began experiencing chronic fatigue and body pain so severe that sometimes it hurt just to lie down on her mattress. Because her problems mirrored those being reported by thousands of other women with silicone gel implants, she joined the class-action lawsuit in 1993. But sentiment turned against the women in the middle to late 1990s, when high-profile scientific panels said they couldn't prove women with silicone gel implants had higher rates of serious disease than women generally did. Dr. Stuart Bondurant, dean emeritus of the UNC School of Medicine in Chapel Hill, leads. one prestigious panel appointed by Congress. In its 1999 report, Bondurant's committee concluded implants do appear to cause less-serious problems such as swelling, infections in the surrounding tissue and accumulations of blood. But it found the evidence linking the implants to serious illness "insufficient or flawed." Bondurant, in a recent interview, said he sympathized with women like Casselberry, but that science hasn't proven their claims. "These women do have sicknesses. Many of them even die of them," he said. "The tragedy is that this was blamed on the implants when that wasn't the cause." Such talk from doctors infuriates Casselberry. "Quite frankly, I don't care what they say. Any of them," she said. "I know what I'm going through." She suspects the silicone spills precipitate a new syndrome inside women's bodies, but most researchers haven't identified it because they have been looking for links to already-known diseases. That view is seconded by Dr. Kolb, an Atlanta plastic surgeon and former breast implant patient who is also part of the class-action lawsuit. "It devastates people's lives," she said of the illnesses. But "the general public doesn't care."

----- Original Message ----- From: Bojohns@...To: idagirl@...Sent: Tuesday, April 16, 2002 12:41 PMSubject: Re: Dr in North Carolina area ? Hi. Saw your post. Don't know of any in NC--if you don't get responses you can start looking by the website for the American Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons as they have a Find a Doctor program. When you click on a doctors name, you can determine from their procedures whether they remove implants. To find out if they remove "en bloc" you will have to call their offices and mind you--many office girls will say they do and you will find out otherwise from the doctor. I suspect the object is just to get you in the office so they can sell you on removal in any fashion--telling you en bloc isn't necessary. Plastic surgeons are essentially salespeople. So I'd get the girls' name and tell her to ask the doctor and call you back. Your friend not only wants someone to do this "en bloc" she wants someone who has done it frequently--and she wants to see proof of that. She can see files without seeing names. (Their best excuse is that they can't divulge the privacy of the files) This may take some aggressiveness on the patient's part--but it's time to start questioning these doctors--especially the plastic surgeons who are known to mislead and outright lie a lot. If you know any physicians from any other specialties, they will tell you that plastic surgeons do not enjoy respect from the rest of medicine--never have. There is a site called explantation.com with some doctors recommended--a lot depends on whether she is involved in a suit, etc. You might visit it if you haven't already. There is a Dr. Dowden in Ky or Tenn and someone in SC. Write if you have questions, OK? Best wishes, Bonnie (Bos@...)