THE GIBBONS STRIKE BACK
Apr. 9th, 2009 05:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thessalianSo, after my wait, I see Fetus!Registrar.
I DO NOT LIKE FETUS!REGISTRAR.
Essentially, he ignored or interrupted everything I said about any symptoms that did not involve the head pain. I tried to tell him about the hard time I was having stringing sentences together and miscellaneous other problems, and those got ignored. I wasn't even allowed to get as far as some of said symptoms before he started asking questions that brought us back to the pain aspect of things, going through over a decade's worth of headache-related medical history without listening when I tried to come in with, "But there are all these other symptoms now". During the routine testing, when he asked me to follow where he was moving his finger with my eyes, he asked if I was getting double vision, and when I explained that actually, I couldn't even focus enough to tell him that much (I was tracking on movement alone; any other detail was truly beyond me), he ignored that too.
He then proceeded to outline a treatment plan for the head-pain, and nothing but the head pain. Which would be something if half of what he outlined hadn't been tried six years ago. And yes, he knew that the 'low-dose antidepressants that are good for migraine prevention' angle had been tried in my case because I told him so. The only difference in treatment is this stuff I'm supposed to take when I have an attack and then can't take any more if it doesn't work because you can only use the stuff a couple of times a week without risking analgesic overuse headache. I don't know what part of "attacks hit a minimum of four days out of every seven" he didn't understand.
Worst part? He didn't even prescribe the meds himself. Instead he talked about writing to my GP and recommending that said GP do all the prescription stuff. What he doesn't seem to understand is that a) this is going to be a time-consuming process if it has to go through channels that way and b) WE ARE COMING UP ON A FOUR-DAY BANK HOLIDAY. He won't even have the letter dictated until Tuesday.
In short, while I am otherwise engaged on Tuesday (interview to deal with getting my NI number sorted out once and for all), Wednesday is going to heavily involve getting an appointment with my GP to get a second opinion. It will take even longer, but at least I stand a better chance of getting someone who will listen to me. Also, when I get my copy of this stupid, "Please prescribe this patient these meds" letter, I will look at the name on it, and then I will contact the Patient Advice Liaison Service and ask the procedure for making a formal complaint. I appreciate that shit happens and it was good of them to squeeze me into the schedule despite not being on the clinic list for the day, I really do. But if you're going to make that kind of effort to see someone, maybe listening to the symptoms involved might be a worthwhile thing to do? So it's not a total and complete waste of time?
Fucking gibbons.
Oh yeah, and Lynn Cullen gets a mention on TV Tropes. It will just never wither away and die, will it?
I DO NOT LIKE FETUS!REGISTRAR.
Essentially, he ignored or interrupted everything I said about any symptoms that did not involve the head pain. I tried to tell him about the hard time I was having stringing sentences together and miscellaneous other problems, and those got ignored. I wasn't even allowed to get as far as some of said symptoms before he started asking questions that brought us back to the pain aspect of things, going through over a decade's worth of headache-related medical history without listening when I tried to come in with, "But there are all these other symptoms now". During the routine testing, when he asked me to follow where he was moving his finger with my eyes, he asked if I was getting double vision, and when I explained that actually, I couldn't even focus enough to tell him that much (I was tracking on movement alone; any other detail was truly beyond me), he ignored that too.
He then proceeded to outline a treatment plan for the head-pain, and nothing but the head pain. Which would be something if half of what he outlined hadn't been tried six years ago. And yes, he knew that the 'low-dose antidepressants that are good for migraine prevention' angle had been tried in my case because I told him so. The only difference in treatment is this stuff I'm supposed to take when I have an attack and then can't take any more if it doesn't work because you can only use the stuff a couple of times a week without risking analgesic overuse headache. I don't know what part of "attacks hit a minimum of four days out of every seven" he didn't understand.
Worst part? He didn't even prescribe the meds himself. Instead he talked about writing to my GP and recommending that said GP do all the prescription stuff. What he doesn't seem to understand is that a) this is going to be a time-consuming process if it has to go through channels that way and b) WE ARE COMING UP ON A FOUR-DAY BANK HOLIDAY. He won't even have the letter dictated until Tuesday.
In short, while I am otherwise engaged on Tuesday (interview to deal with getting my NI number sorted out once and for all), Wednesday is going to heavily involve getting an appointment with my GP to get a second opinion. It will take even longer, but at least I stand a better chance of getting someone who will listen to me. Also, when I get my copy of this stupid, "Please prescribe this patient these meds" letter, I will look at the name on it, and then I will contact the Patient Advice Liaison Service and ask the procedure for making a formal complaint. I appreciate that shit happens and it was good of them to squeeze me into the schedule despite not being on the clinic list for the day, I really do. But if you're going to make that kind of effort to see someone, maybe listening to the symptoms involved might be a worthwhile thing to do? So it's not a total and complete waste of time?
Fucking gibbons.
Oh yeah, and Lynn Cullen gets a mention on TV Tropes. It will just never wither away and die, will it?