Re: Hello All
Jo Ellen Finkelstein (ghellen(AT)ninenet.com)
Wed, 03 Jun 1998 01:29:40 -0500
GardnerSnD(AT)aol.com wrote:
>
> I want to thank everyone who has been keeping in touch with my progress. It's
> been one heck of time lately.
>
> I went in for the Evoked Potential tests, which didn't turn out to be that
> bad, but it did take two days. I went to my nureo for an appointment on
> Tuesday morning to get the results and was told that they couldn't get a good
> reading so I have to have them done again in their office instead of the
> office across town. In the process they "lost" my records. They were able to
> track down the blood tests and they all came back normal. My neuro then
> scheduled me for a Spinal Tap for that afternoon. I showed up and three
> different people told me that the tap "isn't a big deal" even as it was being
> performed. Not to scare anyone, but it was the most pain I have ever felt in
> my life. Or so I thought.
>
> I went home on Tuesday with orders to lay down for 24 hours and begin taking
> the steroid Dexamethasone for 12 days. I woke up early Wednesday morning not
> able to move my neck in any direction, accompanied by the most intense,
> crushing pain I have ever experienced beginning between my shoulderblades up
> to the base of my skull. I called the neuro who prescribed Tylenol 3 and was
> told to lay on a heating pad. Thank God my mother decided to come and stay
> with me. By Thursday I was a raving lunatic. I couldn't move from side to
> side, couldn't get comfortable and could not find any relief from the pain.
> No follow-up from my nuero. I called the neuro and spoke to one of his
> associates who prescribed a muscle relaxer (Skelaxin). I had to call my
> pharmacy's phone number into the nuero's emergency number because he "has
> other patients and can't wait for someone to locate the number". Still no
> relief. Then I got angry! I had had enough.
>
> I called my Primary Care Physician on Friday morning who also got very angry
> that I had been in that much pain for so long without relief. He prescribed a
> "full body assault" cocktail which consisted of the Dexamethasone for the
> inflammation in the spinal cord, double up on the Skelaxin to loosen the
> muscles to allow the Naproxin he prescribed to work into the soft tissue and
> double up on the Tylenol 3 to cut the pain and knock me out so everything else
> could work. His direction was to take it all, together, lay down, don't move
> and let it work. Six hours later I woke up and finally had some relief!. I
> called the neuro on Monday morning after keeping up the cocktail over the
> weekend and told them I would be in his office that day and he WILL see me. I
> still had a stiff neck, but the pain had greatly subsided.
>
> The neuro kept me waiting for 45 minutes in the waiting room while the pain in
> my neck and head began to return. By the time I actually got into his office,
> I ripped him a new one. His diagnosis was an LP headache that could only be
> cured by having a blood patch done at the site of the spinal tap. He said the
> drugs I was taking would not work and would provide no relief, even as I was
> telling him that the drugs DID provide relief. He couldn't tell he how the
> "blood patch" would work or what was involved, just that it had to be done by
> an Anastesiologist and couldn't be done in his office. Basically, he could
> screw me up, but he couldn't fix it. He also informed me that "No, I don't
> follow up with my patients. I don't have time to call them all." I, in turn,
> informed him that he has one less patient now.
>
> To make matters worse, the Evoked Potential tests "couldn't be read clearly"
> and told me I would have to have them done again. Of course, this time I
> "wouldn't need a referral and there will be no charge." I will have the tests
> redone, but not by him, and not by his office.
>
> The results on the spinal tap showed proteins evident that indicate
> inflammation of the spinal cord (duh!) and 18 white blood cells that show the
> same. He thinks it may be MS, but the MRI of my brain didn't show any scars
> or lesions associated with that so he thinks his original diagnosis of
> Lhermitt's Sign is the first "episode" of MS and needs to be tracked with
> another MRI in a few months. He definitely thinks it's a "Myletin Disorder".
> My diagnosis: The guy is not fit to be practicing medicine.
>
> My Primary Care Physician is putting together a list of neurologists for me to
> "interview" before preceeding to another one to give me some piece of mind
> that I'll get the "right" doctor this time. He is also getting me information
> to report this guy to the State Medical Board if I decide to go that course
> and he has taken him off his referral list.
>
> The good news is that the steroid seems to be working. The numbness is gone
> from my left arm, leg, hand and palm and I am getting the feeling back in my
> thumb and forefinger. I still have the electric jolts when I move my chin
> towards my chest, but I can deal with that after all of this. I stopped
> taking the muscle relaxer, Naproxin and Tylenol 3 and have spent last night
> and all day today "coming down" from it all. No neck pain. No headache. I
> still have a few days to go on the steriod and will continue with that since
> it is helping. Then I'm off to a new neuro who can hopefully help with
> whatever this turns out to be.
>
> Sorry this is so long and wordy. I just needed to "dump" it all out and get
> it off my chest.
>
> SandyHi Sandy, Joellen here. GOOD FOR YOU !!! that "jerk" needed a new one
ripped! Hope you find a better neuro (some of them have that "total God
complex) Hope you feel better soon.