Now I am the patient and, boy, did I get PISSED yesterday! Situation: I called 4 weeks ago to schedule my follow up voice therapy only to be told that they would schedule that at my follow-up appointment. Well that was yesterday and after the LONGEST appointment of my life (see below), I was told the first voice therapy appointment was in 3 weeks! Are you freaking kidding me?? I just had surgery on my VOICE people!! And it's hard to raise hell without one, but I did my best! I was huffing and puffing like I had run a marathon and my eyes probably looked like they were gonna roll outta my head! I was being as obvious as I could short of flipping her and the whole office off (even though it wasn't her fault). My main point was that is WAS NOT OK to schedule my first appointment at the end of my medical leave!I'm sure it was comical to the scheduler... at first. She got pretty serious after I wrote down that I wanted to make a complaint. I received a call an hour after leaving and got in next Wednesday. Awwww, that's better. :)
Ok, here's a little more NEW perspective regarding the medical community. I pride myself on being respectful of my patient's time. Now, I'm not always right on the dot, but if I'm 5 minutes late, we make it up at the end. Let me just tell you how the WORST APPOINTMENT OF MY LIFE went: The ENT comes in, sprays my nose with numbing agent 'cuz he's gonna take a look at how the healing's going. He leaves for 25 minutes, comes back for 5 horrible minutes of unsuccessfully forcing an endoscope through my very much alive right nostril, pulling it back out, spraying the other side and leaving for another 20 minutes... Oh, GOD, NO! Yep, he comes back and almost puts the endoscope back down the right side. I gestured that he numbed the other side and he again says, "Stop me if it hurts TOO much." Of course it's gonna hurt too much, you numbed it 20 minutes ago!! Suffice to say, I squeezed those armrests, let some tears fall and gagged 3 times, but all and all was a big girl about the whole thing. As he's walking out, he says I look pretty red and swollen still and given my vocal quality, he's prescribing steroids to help the healing process out. Then says I need to start voice therapy ASAP.
The most frustrating part of this: This type of experience happens ALL the time, to ALL kinds of patients and their families. It happens to adults and children alike. It happens after SERIOUS diagnoses and surgeries!
I knew better than to say that I would wait 3 weeks for voice therapy. What if I weren't a speech language pathologist??
It PISSES ME OFF and makes me want to do that much better as a medical professional. I will continue to work to earn the trust of the families and kids that I work with. And to treat their time and feelings with care and respect... not to mention COMPASSION.
If this strikes a nerve for any of you, let me know! I am going to write a letter of complaint and will take any feedback about similar experiences to better the service I give!
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I'm re-reading these posts, Snow, and just want to say again how proud I am FOR you! So grateful that I'm learning about your journey in this way. I say proud FOR you because I am very aware that the strength, courage & humor it takes to be where you are is wholly attributed to you. Experiences like the one above are trials for the soul at the best of times. And you stayed your ground, you kept your sense self, and didn't allow yourself to identify with the treatment you received. That's big. B-i-g. Big! I'm following your lead, Sister, and mirroring that in areas of my own life. Thank you! Love, Rach
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