Some medical people need their license yanked

A week ago this past Friday my wife gets up and her wrist is swollen and she is complaining of being in a lot of pain and heads off for work. When she gets home Saturday morning it isn't any better, in fact it is worse so off she goes to the ER since her "doctor" doesn't work on Saturdays. After examining her they confirm my suspicion that she has tendinitis and prescribe her some pain pills and an anti inflammatory and tell her to follow up with her health care provider if it doesn't improve or gets worse in the next several days. Well it doesn't get worse but there was no improvement so off she goes to her "doctor" which is a nurse practitioner. This NP is all "upset" that no x-rays were taken and sends my wife to the hospital to get that done and says she will call her with the results and with a treatment plan. This was last Thursday.

On Monday afternoon my wife still had not heard from this NP so she called her. The NP gets on the phone and asks if things are any better and my wife said no. It is still swollen and she is still in a lot of pain. The NP then proceeds to tell my wife that the X-ray was normal and there was nothing she could do for my wife. Not that the NP didn't know what to do, not that she was going to have her see an ortho specialist or even the MD she works under or even prescribing some more anti-inflamatories and some type of pain reliever. She told my wife that there was NOTHING she could do. Give me a break.

My wife has been seeing this NP for almost 10 years now and up the last year she seemed to really care and would do what ever she could, but in this past year something changed. I don't know if her practice has became too large for her to handle, if she is becoming burned out or what. Personally I don't care what this NP's problem is but as far as I am concerned she either needs to solve it or get out of the health care field. Too bad being an uncaring jerk is not enough to get some one's license yanked.

I really have to wonder anymore what is wrong with these so-called medical professionals.

Anyway, the end of the story is that my wife went doctor hunting and has an appointment with a Family doctor who just set up a practice with the doctor who delivered our son. Hopefully he will be a little more sympathetic and active in the care of his patients.

It seems to me like that medical field in general is getting worse and worse. No one wants to take the time to do or explain anything. Offices are always crowded, and staff tired and/or rude. Here in FL drs are getting busted or harrassed for prescribing pain meds bc of the dumba**** that are just looking for pills, and now seem afraid to give them to the people who need them. I hope it doesnt get worse if this magical medical coverage that the government is trying to pull off goes through. Does anybody know the difference between dr shopping and trying different drs till you find the right one for you?

I truely hope that your wife gets some relief with her new dr. That is rediculous that she couldnt even see the real dr when the NP couldn't handle the problem!! Good luck.

Heather

awe Jim, so very sorry your wife had to go thru this, and an MRI should've been ordered in case it
was a stress fracture..Geezee...
Have your wife ask at the next doctor for an mri...and send my hugz and prayers to her for me....
Hope she feels better soon...
(((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((Jim's Wife)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Jim,
Is there a good hand specialist around? I know the doc who did both my carpal tunnel surgeries I've also gone to any time there was something wrong with my hands, wrists, etc. And he knows his stuff.

Sadly, I do think medicine has changed so much in the past 20-30 years, and IMHO it all started with the advent of HMO's, and the insurance companies regulating everything a doctor does. Now that's not saying all doctors are good and all insurance companies are bad (don't want to get political), but my professional experience as a health care provider has given me an inside view on what happens, and what scares me is that all the medical professionals are now trained within this new system, which really includes managing the business/payment aspects so much so that I think patient care has been too often forgotten. And doctors that do take Medicare or Medicaid get reimbursed so little (and even from some private insurance companies reimbursement rates are low) they have to see so many patients just to pay office expenses. I'm not justifying extravagant salaries for doctors, just saying there's now a layer of paperpushes in both the insurance companies and the doctor's offices that adds to expenses, and interferes (IMHO) with the focus being on treating the patient.

I'm scared because as I am nearing 60, I will need a lot of these younger docs and others and they don't know the difference from what it was before. All they know is a system regulated by authorization codes and whether or not the insurance company is going to pay for something.

Ok, I'll get off my soap box!

Pixie - I didn't know you were in Florida. No wonder you're having trouble. I happened to catch part of Dr. Phil yesterday (which I rarely watch) but listened to part of it because he was talking about addiction and chronic pain. And they were showing how easy it was to buy oxycontin from doctor's offices and guess which state they used? Florida! I saw these people getting hundreds of oxycontin tabs easily from doctors and scratched my head because I know how most of us in the rest of the country are begging for one pill! (and I don't want to get off on illegal stuff, which is against the forum rules, so if a moderator wants to delete this that's fine with me!) Anyway, I feel for you pixie being in Florida!

Enough of my rant!

PaLady