Some hope for doctors after all?

[Guest guest]

Heya all:

I've been not feeling real well, so haven't been posting a lot, but I do read

every post. If you have personally emailed me, I will get back to you... Just

give me some time. An interesting thing happened today, which made me slightly

rise my expectations of those who carry white coats. They, of course, being

the supreme all-knowing beings, and myself being a lowly not-knowing-much

paramedic. Can anyone see the sarcasm coming out of my ears?

As some of you know, I got hurt not that long ago. I woke up this morning and

my left arm was not moving or acting like it should. There was a lot of soft

tissue swelling around my elbow, which hadn't been there last night when I went

to bed. The pain wasn't just localized to the elbow joint anymore as it had

been previously, but went down into my fingers and up into my shoulder. I would

have passed it off as a Lupus/Spondylitis flare, except for the sharp stabbing

pains radiating down my arm.

I decided I'd go to our local urgent care place and have them look at it...

What could it hurt? I didn't want to go to ER, because even though I knew I'd

get seen right away, I didn't want everyone making a fuss. Sometimes, it's nice

to go where people don't know you're a medical professional.

Our local urgent care/primary care clinic is kind of a neat place. They don't

do appointments. They take walk ins, and they do this thing called Web Checkin.

You fill out all your paperwork online, and they call you to confirm it. One of

the questions they ask is how long it will take you to get there. Then, you

wait at home till they are about however many minutes you said it would take you

to get there plus five or ten from seeing you. In my case, I told them thirty

minutes, so at about forty minutes till they wanted me there, they called. As

soon as you get there, you go right into a room and the nurse is like right

there and the doctor is usually right on his/her heels.

Well, I told the doc what was going on, and dang it, she read my chart

thoroughly and found out I was a paramedic, but that was ok, since she didn't

mention it. She decided to get some x-rays of my arm/shoulder/wrist. That done

with, she pronounce my elbow " healing " and the rest of my " OW, THAT HURTS! " to a

Lupus/Spondylitis flare because of the recent rains we've had.

I told her I'd figured as much, but just wanted to be sure.

Now, I know you're all going what's so remarkable here? Here it comes.

She told me about raising my dose of pred, which I was amenable to, gave me some

anesthetic cream, which I was also happy with, refilled my Ketamine cream,

again, I can't complain, and then, she turned to me and said... " While I'm

here, is there anything else I can get for you? You know your disease better

than anyone and I'm open to anything within reason. "

My mouth kindda fell open at that. Is this a test? I couldn't help but wonder.

I tentatively said, " Promethazine? "

" Anything else, " she asked.

" Something for my anxiety? "

" I can do that. I see you've taken Valium, " she said. Then, she flipped

through my chart. " You are on a lot of pain medications. "

Oh boy, I thought, here it comes...

" I see that you try to rotate your breakthrough meds, and I also see that we've

given you Norco in the past. Do you have any Norco right now? "

Well, it's true, they have written me scripts for Norco for one reason or

another. It's also true that I try to rotate my BT meds. It's also true that

sometimes, for one reason or another, I don't feel comfortable taking all my

meds with me everywhere I go. Let me explain real quick. One time, I had to

work a tripple shooting in a really bad neighborhood. It was the kind of

neighborhood where my personal med kit would have been well appreciated by the

inhabitants. So, I just took my trusty bottle of Norco. I'd rather lose it,

since I'm not dependent on it at all, cause I usually only take it when I have a

port infection.

The amount of Norco they usually give me is like 12, just a perfect number.

So, back to her question... " No I don't, but I don't take it that often... I

mean I have so many meds for pain, nine in all, and I only use Norco when I get

a port infection or a major flare, or if I don't want to take my meds into an

area where I'm afraid they'll get stolen... I know I rotate my breakthrough

meds, but I do that on a monthly basis, and all my meds are Schedule II and I

really don't need it and... "

She looked at me and kind of smiled. " Well, apparently, you were bothered

enough with all those schedule II medications to come into the clinic today, "

she said. " I'll write you a script for norco, and if you don't take it, you can

save it for your next infection. "

" Uh, ok, " I stammered.

" Is there anything else you need? Do you need any refills on any of your other

meds? " I didn't, so we left.

Rod was talking to the lady at the desk about how compassionate the doctor

seemed, and I was standing there in a daze when the doctor came over and gave me

my scripts. Then, she looked into my face and said, " I have Fibromyalgia. I do

understand. "

--

Dodge

" I make the living, my dog makes the living worthwhile. "

Read my blog at:

http://jumpthis.wordpress.com