Post by rhodygirl on Jan 24, 2011 16:54:26 GMT -5
Can I vent for a bit? Pretty please?
Okay, so my Gynae was referred to me and touted to be one of the best in her field locally for gyn-surgery, etc. -- I did searches for her and found she had some pretty impressive credentials. I will say I am grateful that at my first appt she recommended a Lap to dx for Endo. That I am thankful for...everything else just plain sucks.
We had 2 in depth conversations about what the lap surgery would entail and concluded that if she should encounter any endo, other issues INCLUDING adhesions from my previous gallbladder surgery she would remove whatever she found. She assured me that "whatever she found" she would "remove". I told her how I run my own business & it is the sole income for my family & that I was really counting on this surgery to be a "one stop shop for me" and could not afford to be out of work again for multiple surgeries.
Fast forward to surgery...she herself never came to see me afterwards. My husband said she was so quick with him when she came to talk to him after surgery that all he got out of it was that there was a cyst she drained, a fibroid and endo all over the place. There was another surgeon at the hospital that assisted her during surgery and she's the one that came in while I was in recovery --blurted out to me that it was Endo, it was everywhere and she's putting me on Lupron -- then she darted away before I could say much of anything. The nurse went through a few things with me after I noticed she flipped a page and there were some photos in the file and I asked a few questions while still loopy from surgery. I had no answers on where the Endo was, what kind of cyst & how big, why she didn't remove the fibroid, etc. But, I had been forewarned that she didn't have the best bedside manner but she was a great surgeon. Fine....
Fast forward 2 days post-op, the pain meds are not working. So, I call her office and her nurse answers the phone and tells me "Oh that's really strange, try doubling up and see if that works". While I had her on the phone I asked a few ??'s about my surgery & she responds by telling me that whatever the Dr. found she'll discuss with me at my follow up appt. and if it was anything "important" she would have let me know. Hmm, I guess Endo "everywhere", a fibroid, an ovarian cyst, etc. are not "important" to them, but they are to ME!
So, I go to my follow up appt & I asked her if she found anything up near my gallbladder surgery location. She said "No". I said "really, nothing at all? that's so weird." She repeats.."No". I then asked how big the cyst was and she tells me "not that big"(I was told by her nurse on the phone when I asked that it was a good size). I asked her why the fibroid wasn't removed & she said because she would have had to perform the larger surgery and she knew I wasn't prepared for that. Now, I did not *want* it if I didn't need it, but WTF lady...I told you THIS WAS MY CHANCE TO GET THIS SH@T DONE! I asked her why she didn't get all the endo out & she said it was all over the cul-de-sac and there were so many lesions she couldn't get it all out and we needed to treat with Lupron. She touted is as the "best drug to ever come out for endometriosis". After that I kind of shut down and was ready to get out of there. I called back to ask some questions & got a wee bit of info but not much more.
I actually went so far as to get the Lupron approved with my insurance company, which was a two day battle and afterward I chickened out. I came to the conclusion that I'd be trading one set of horrible symptoms for another and it scared me too much. I am that girl that gets every possible symptom of everything I've taken in the past, so it seems unlikely and risky to me to try Lupron. So, I called her office and told the nurse. She seemed put off that I was refusing it and kept telling me she would never prescribe something that would do anything harmful and that all I would have is hot flashes. That annoyed me, too.
So...I've been scouring the web for another Dr. and decided I better get my records from the hospital now. Today I picked them up and don't you know it says IN THE SURGICAL REPORT that I have adhesions on the edge of my liver and intestines. Are you kidding me? I asked her multiple times. I even told her I can't sleep on my side because it feels like everything is pulling. I told her how I can blindly point to the part of my abdomen that the pain is coming from and if I lift my shirt my finger is on top of my incision scar every time. So, not only did she not tell me, she LEFT them there! She assured me she'd remove any adhesions if she found any and Endo for that matter if she found either.
I paid a $2,000 deductible and a week long recovery for this lady to drain a cyst (why she didn't remove it is beyond me), and sever my uterosacral nerve which grows back. She left in ALL the endo (her nurse had given me the impression she had removed a lot of it and that was the reason for my post surgery pain), she left in the fibroid, she left in the adhesions that she failed to tell me about. The only endo she removed was the piece for biopsy. I'm so mad I'm spitting fire right now.
Okay, so my Gynae was referred to me and touted to be one of the best in her field locally for gyn-surgery, etc. -- I did searches for her and found she had some pretty impressive credentials. I will say I am grateful that at my first appt she recommended a Lap to dx for Endo. That I am thankful for...everything else just plain sucks.
We had 2 in depth conversations about what the lap surgery would entail and concluded that if she should encounter any endo, other issues INCLUDING adhesions from my previous gallbladder surgery she would remove whatever she found. She assured me that "whatever she found" she would "remove". I told her how I run my own business & it is the sole income for my family & that I was really counting on this surgery to be a "one stop shop for me" and could not afford to be out of work again for multiple surgeries.
Fast forward to surgery...she herself never came to see me afterwards. My husband said she was so quick with him when she came to talk to him after surgery that all he got out of it was that there was a cyst she drained, a fibroid and endo all over the place. There was another surgeon at the hospital that assisted her during surgery and she's the one that came in while I was in recovery --blurted out to me that it was Endo, it was everywhere and she's putting me on Lupron -- then she darted away before I could say much of anything. The nurse went through a few things with me after I noticed she flipped a page and there were some photos in the file and I asked a few questions while still loopy from surgery. I had no answers on where the Endo was, what kind of cyst & how big, why she didn't remove the fibroid, etc. But, I had been forewarned that she didn't have the best bedside manner but she was a great surgeon. Fine....
Fast forward 2 days post-op, the pain meds are not working. So, I call her office and her nurse answers the phone and tells me "Oh that's really strange, try doubling up and see if that works". While I had her on the phone I asked a few ??'s about my surgery & she responds by telling me that whatever the Dr. found she'll discuss with me at my follow up appt. and if it was anything "important" she would have let me know. Hmm, I guess Endo "everywhere", a fibroid, an ovarian cyst, etc. are not "important" to them, but they are to ME!
So, I go to my follow up appt & I asked her if she found anything up near my gallbladder surgery location. She said "No". I said "really, nothing at all? that's so weird." She repeats.."No". I then asked how big the cyst was and she tells me "not that big"(I was told by her nurse on the phone when I asked that it was a good size). I asked her why the fibroid wasn't removed & she said because she would have had to perform the larger surgery and she knew I wasn't prepared for that. Now, I did not *want* it if I didn't need it, but WTF lady...I told you THIS WAS MY CHANCE TO GET THIS SH@T DONE! I asked her why she didn't get all the endo out & she said it was all over the cul-de-sac and there were so many lesions she couldn't get it all out and we needed to treat with Lupron. She touted is as the "best drug to ever come out for endometriosis". After that I kind of shut down and was ready to get out of there. I called back to ask some questions & got a wee bit of info but not much more.
I actually went so far as to get the Lupron approved with my insurance company, which was a two day battle and afterward I chickened out. I came to the conclusion that I'd be trading one set of horrible symptoms for another and it scared me too much. I am that girl that gets every possible symptom of everything I've taken in the past, so it seems unlikely and risky to me to try Lupron. So, I called her office and told the nurse. She seemed put off that I was refusing it and kept telling me she would never prescribe something that would do anything harmful and that all I would have is hot flashes. That annoyed me, too.
So...I've been scouring the web for another Dr. and decided I better get my records from the hospital now. Today I picked them up and don't you know it says IN THE SURGICAL REPORT that I have adhesions on the edge of my liver and intestines. Are you kidding me? I asked her multiple times. I even told her I can't sleep on my side because it feels like everything is pulling. I told her how I can blindly point to the part of my abdomen that the pain is coming from and if I lift my shirt my finger is on top of my incision scar every time. So, not only did she not tell me, she LEFT them there! She assured me she'd remove any adhesions if she found any and Endo for that matter if she found either.
I paid a $2,000 deductible and a week long recovery for this lady to drain a cyst (why she didn't remove it is beyond me), and sever my uterosacral nerve which grows back. She left in ALL the endo (her nurse had given me the impression she had removed a lot of it and that was the reason for my post surgery pain), she left in the fibroid, she left in the adhesions that she failed to tell me about. The only endo she removed was the piece for biopsy. I'm so mad I'm spitting fire right now.