These foolish games...
It's Good Friday, almost everyone I know has the day off, and work is slow. I'm sure I could do something, but why should I? I should have the damn day off!
Last weekend I slept funny on my shoulder, and woke up in a lot of pain. I've had some issues with that shoulder for at least six months; my masseuse always spends extra time on it, but could never work out the knots. Well, after I slept funny on it, I realized it was probably a pinched nerve. Just in case, I applied heat to it and also tried an Icy Hot patch; neither did anything, suggesting it's not muscular. So I went to my PA (physician assistant).
He spent a cursory four seconds feeling around the shoulder and then said, "Were you in a car accident?"
Me: "No. Well, wait - yeah, when I was 19." [I'm 30 now.]
Him: "Did you hurt your neck?"
Me: "No, I had pulled muscles in my back."
Him: "We need to send you for an X-ray right now."
I go down the hall and get my neck X-rayed. I come back and hand him the films, which I had looked at after they were taken. He puts them up and says, "There it is, right there."
Me: "What?"
Him: "You have a reverse curvature of your neck and a slightly compressed C-spine."
Me: "I'm not a radiologist, but the spine looks fine to me." [All the vertebrae were very neatly and evenly spaced, looking like every other healthy spinal X-ray I've ever seen. And bear in mind I read a lot of true crime, so I've seen a lot of X-rays.]
Him: "No, no, no. You're going to have to go to physical therapy and get this taken care of. And here's a script for a muscle relaxant." [Hadn't we established it wasn't muscular?]
I took the scripts and left. Then I called my boss's PA, who had found the blockage in his heart (called "the Widowmaker" for its propensity to kill when the artery is fully blocked), and who he said was fabulous.
I go in and see the new PA. I explain what happened with the previous PA.
She said, "Were the X-rays looked at by a radiologist?"
Me: "No, he just slapped them up on the screen."
Her: "That is ridiculous. That's not his call to make. We're going to get the X-rays over here [this is in a building down the street] and have a radiologist read them. Don't do anything until you hear from me."
She also told me that all the doctors who have told me to lift weights conventionally are idiots. "When you lift successively higher weights, you tear your muscle. In people who don't have fibromyalgia, this is fine; but in those who do have fibro, the muscles don't repair themselves all the way, if at all." She recommended I stay around ten pounds and just increase my reps.
Remember my sinus infection? I still have it, and the previous PA prescribed antibiotics that typically don't work on sinus infections. When I told her I had had a sinus CT, she said, "What did it say?" I said, "I have no idea, they just called me and told me I needed antibiotics." She also said that if you can see a sinus problem on a CT scan, it usually means it's chronic. Wonder how long I've had it?
So, the bad news is, my previous doctors and PA are utter morons. The good news is, I really like my new one, and she gets stuff done. So hooray for that!
Last weekend I slept funny on my shoulder, and woke up in a lot of pain. I've had some issues with that shoulder for at least six months; my masseuse always spends extra time on it, but could never work out the knots. Well, after I slept funny on it, I realized it was probably a pinched nerve. Just in case, I applied heat to it and also tried an Icy Hot patch; neither did anything, suggesting it's not muscular. So I went to my PA (physician assistant).
He spent a cursory four seconds feeling around the shoulder and then said, "Were you in a car accident?"
Me: "No. Well, wait - yeah, when I was 19." [I'm 30 now.]
Him: "Did you hurt your neck?"
Me: "No, I had pulled muscles in my back."
Him: "We need to send you for an X-ray right now."
I go down the hall and get my neck X-rayed. I come back and hand him the films, which I had looked at after they were taken. He puts them up and says, "There it is, right there."
Me: "What?"
Him: "You have a reverse curvature of your neck and a slightly compressed C-spine."
Me: "I'm not a radiologist, but the spine looks fine to me." [All the vertebrae were very neatly and evenly spaced, looking like every other healthy spinal X-ray I've ever seen. And bear in mind I read a lot of true crime, so I've seen a lot of X-rays.]
Him: "No, no, no. You're going to have to go to physical therapy and get this taken care of. And here's a script for a muscle relaxant." [Hadn't we established it wasn't muscular?]
I took the scripts and left. Then I called my boss's PA, who had found the blockage in his heart (called "the Widowmaker" for its propensity to kill when the artery is fully blocked), and who he said was fabulous.
I go in and see the new PA. I explain what happened with the previous PA.
She said, "Were the X-rays looked at by a radiologist?"
Me: "No, he just slapped them up on the screen."
Her: "That is ridiculous. That's not his call to make. We're going to get the X-rays over here [this is in a building down the street] and have a radiologist read them. Don't do anything until you hear from me."
She also told me that all the doctors who have told me to lift weights conventionally are idiots. "When you lift successively higher weights, you tear your muscle. In people who don't have fibromyalgia, this is fine; but in those who do have fibro, the muscles don't repair themselves all the way, if at all." She recommended I stay around ten pounds and just increase my reps.
Remember my sinus infection? I still have it, and the previous PA prescribed antibiotics that typically don't work on sinus infections. When I told her I had had a sinus CT, she said, "What did it say?" I said, "I have no idea, they just called me and told me I needed antibiotics." She also said that if you can see a sinus problem on a CT scan, it usually means it's chronic. Wonder how long I've had it?
So, the bad news is, my previous doctors and PA are utter morons. The good news is, I really like my new one, and she gets stuff done. So hooray for that!