Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Support Group
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS) describes a sense of exhaustion and post-exertion malaise, even when you have gotten enough rest and sleep. The disease is characterized by six months of incapacitating fatigue experienced as profound exhaustion and extremely poor stamina, and problems with concentration and short-term memory. The cause is unknown, but it is a...
Time to Vent......my turn and please take a turn of your own.
I'm sitting here on hold with my doc's office. I was seen the 3rd week of August. Two scripts were to be called in. It took FIVE WEEKS to get the first one. Now it is almost November and I am STILL fighting to get the 2nd script, again on hold and I am so mad/frustrated that my face is leaking..................tut tut it feels like rain.
In mid September Amanda said she would get it handled. I called the pharmacy and the doc's office again. Again the doc's office promised it would get handled. Promises require action.
I finally got Keisha on the line and after a long talk was transferred to the prior authorizations handler Tanya. She is not exactly a "listener". After explaining the situation to her she has now got me on hold so she can go point a finger at Amanda. Goooooooooood Grief. Ridiculous.
Just stop, seriously stop and someone, anyone is this office stop and say,"We are so sorry, we want you to be able to count on us to assist you in a timely manner. We will get this script handled asap."
Give me solid hope that I can get this script. .....as it is I have been weaning myself through this by taking a half amount of the med, because my calls to both this office and the pharmacy have produced zero results.
Soooooo, Tanya and I just had a long talk. She was trying to drive me to CrazyTown and I don't want to go. ENOUGH. That is what I said, Enough. I have tried to explain, tried to get results, there is no time or need to keep pointing fingers, let's get this done. What is the bottom line here? So she tells me that I need to sit down with Dr. Elliott. Another finger point. I said I have.............when I was there in August, I expressed my concern that the two scripts would not get handled properly because it has been a problem in the past.
Tanya is sitting there talking on and on about my responsibilities as a patient. I all but slapped her through the phone. I lost it, my voice got so quiet, so controlled, so serious, so venomous, it is a wonder her arms didn't fall off her body, leaving her hands to fly up and root themselves on her shoulders. Go ahead and prom wave now Tanya.......it is a very silly rude picture to paint of anyone, I have lost 94% of my adult cool and have reverted to teen revenge thinking.
Don't rile a bear little Tanya, duck and run.
I let her have it. Let her have it with both barrels...........stop blaming me when your office is functioning at sub par and step up, let's tell me, your PATIENT that it will get handled asap, that you are sorry, on behalf of anyone who dropped the ball. Stop lecturing me when I have done nothing wrong. I have called your office how many times to get TWO medications since August. SHAME ON YOU for lecturing me, lecture your own blankety blank selves. Hello, it is November.........wake up!
It takes a lot for me to truly lose my cool. We have no time for superior condescending attitudes from others. It is time for results, for action, for apologies --- for correction. The lecture she gave me was borderline bullying in this patient's opinion. AT some point, your office Tanya has got to commit to getting to work on behalf of those they assist.
If ya'll have hit a wall in patient support than ya'll should use those waiting room chairs to sell shoes. At least people would get something during the long wait................add pedis/manis/sell sandwiches and cold drinks......and use the money to hire a great office manager. Something, do something, don't brow beat a patient whose only CRIME is needing her medications...................ok I feel sort of better now. Out with the bad air in with the good.
I can already hear the aftershocks.........get a new doc. Sounds so simple. In the area where I live there are 3 rheumies. OF the three my doc is the only one with extensive ability/success as both a great rheumatologist and immunologist as well. The other two rheumies have worse problems, I have looked into it, trust me. This is the best in my area.
Call me a monkey head.......a dodo bird......... but I want a life with dignity.........I think if I try others should too...........if I could sit under a pyramid and get cured by eating ground up peach pits I would do it.............nobody wants to suffer endlessly with quality of life sucking chronic health and pain problems.......nobody.
Sorry, I thought I was done venting sooner, but I guess I had to let it all out, there there to me, wore myself completely out. Going to crawl into a corner and sleep until April..........
I'm sitting here on hold with my doc's office. I was seen the 3rd week of August. Two scripts were to be called in. It took FIVE WEEKS to get the first one. Now it is almost November and I am STILL fighting to get the 2nd script, again on hold and I am so mad/frustrated that my face is leaking..................tut tut it feels like rain.
In mid September Amanda said she would get it handled. I called the pharmacy and the doc's office again. Again the doc's office promised it would get handled. Promises require action.
I finally got Keisha on the line and after a long talk was transferred to the prior authorizations handler Tanya. She is not exactly a "listener". After explaining the situation to her she has now got me on hold so she can go point a finger at Amanda. Goooooooooood Grief. Ridiculous.
Just stop, seriously stop and someone, anyone is this office stop and say,"We are so sorry, we want you to be able to count on us to assist you in a timely manner. We will get this script handled asap."
Give me solid hope that I can get this script. .....as it is I have been weaning myself through this by taking a half amount of the med, because my calls to both this office and the pharmacy have produced zero results.
Soooooo, Tanya and I just had a long talk. She was trying to drive me to CrazyTown and I don't want to go. ENOUGH. That is what I said, Enough. I have tried to explain, tried to get results, there is no time or need to keep pointing fingers, let's get this done. What is the bottom line here? So she tells me that I need to sit down with Dr. Elliott. Another finger point. I said I have.............when I was there in August, I expressed my concern that the two scripts would not get handled properly because it has been a problem in the past.
Tanya is sitting there talking on and on about my responsibilities as a patient. I all but slapped her through the phone. I lost it, my voice got so quiet, so controlled, so serious, so venomous, it is a wonder her arms didn't fall off her body, leaving her hands to fly up and root themselves on her shoulders. Go ahead and prom wave now Tanya.......it is a very silly rude picture to paint of anyone, I have lost 94% of my adult cool and have reverted to teen revenge thinking.
Don't rile a bear little Tanya, duck and run.
I let her have it. Let her have it with both barrels...........stop blaming me when your office is functioning at sub par and step up, let's tell me, your PATIENT that it will get handled asap, that you are sorry, on behalf of anyone who dropped the ball. Stop lecturing me when I have done nothing wrong. I have called your office how many times to get TWO medications since August. SHAME ON YOU for lecturing me, lecture your own blankety blank selves. Hello, it is November.........wake up!
It takes a lot for me to truly lose my cool. We have no time for superior condescending attitudes from others. It is time for results, for action, for apologies --- for correction. The lecture she gave me was borderline bullying in this patient's opinion. AT some point, your office Tanya has got to commit to getting to work on behalf of those they assist.
If ya'll have hit a wall in patient support than ya'll should use those waiting room chairs to sell shoes. At least people would get something during the long wait................add pedis/manis/sell sandwiches and cold drinks......and use the money to hire a great office manager. Something, do something, don't brow beat a patient whose only CRIME is needing her medications...................ok I feel sort of better now. Out with the bad air in with the good.
I can already hear the aftershocks.........get a new doc. Sounds so simple. In the area where I live there are 3 rheumies. OF the three my doc is the only one with extensive ability/success as both a great rheumatologist and immunologist as well. The other two rheumies have worse problems, I have looked into it, trust me. This is the best in my area.
Call me a monkey head.......a dodo bird......... but I want a life with dignity.........I think if I try others should too...........if I could sit under a pyramid and get cured by eating ground up peach pits I would do it.............nobody wants to suffer endlessly with quality of life sucking chronic health and pain problems.......nobody.
Sorry, I thought I was done venting sooner, but I guess I had to let it all out, there there to me, wore myself completely out. Going to crawl into a corner and sleep until April..........
Oh, it's easy for others to just say go find a new doctor but those of us that have been sick for a long time know that good doctors are as rare as a snow storm in June in the Sahara.
Glad you vented here and got it out. That kind of frustration has a way of putting us down to the point of if the prescription does come through we are too tired to go and pick it up.
Hugs and hope it get's worked out soon.
There were always excuses while he sat around waiting for hours. He finally got so ticked off that he hired a lawyer and sued the doctor for the consequences of his not being at his job for hours and hours. The lost time on his construction projects amounted to tens of thousands of dollars in losses financially.
He won the lawsuit and the doctor had to pay him for every penny of it, plus legal costs.
If I were in your shoes I would call and ask for the doctor. (Whether I got the prescription or not.) Then I would politely tell the doctor how good he is and how much I want to continue seeing him....then tell him how rude his office staff is to me. How despite repeated calls they still have not called in my prescriptions from 2 months ago. And then how I was blamed for it and lectured for their mistakes. I would so name names.
If more people complain, maybe he will fire the bad staff and get people who are at least trying to fix their mistakes. What if it was a life saving medication? You could be dead by now.
My mom told me about a woman who was on public assistance. She had a medical condition that required her to have a pill daily to save her life. I forget why, maybe a heart condition. Public assistance had been paying for her medication, but out of the blue they denied her claim. Guess what? She died. For real. My mom said it was awful, but she would have been more pushy. I decided I would show up at a hospital and explain. I think they would have to give you sometihng, otherwise it would be like murder. She was young too. 20s I think it was.
I think of that story, and then I think of your story, and it just makes me really mad.
going on in his office. At least that's a place to start.
Good to vent here also and get it out of your system.
One
time when I felt I was loosing it with a customer service person
when I got the run around, I said "I can't believe what I'm hearing
and you wouldn't believe how mad I'm getting either". So just
so you know I don't want to start yelling at you, I'm just going to
hang up right now.
. Which I did. that was the best I could do. I find that when
we're really tired, who has the energy to deal with some of
what goes on? not just with doctor's offices but sometimes
with trying to call the utilities, billing
departments or phone companies. Multi
transfers and repeating of information. That can wear me
out as well. Yes. I agree with you. In your case,
their customer
service skills are non existant. I hope you get the
medicine you need . I hope things get better in your
doctor's office.
Sorry to hear aboout your amazingly bad experience with that TOTALLY incompetemt MDs office. I thought I had it bad with incompetemt MDs. idiot nurses and foul mouthed receptionists (I now live in a rural area where medical care is much worse than in metro areas where I used to live). I have also been talked down to by MDs, nurses and their uneducated and lowly paid staff. It is beyond frustrating and annoying. The stories I could tell you.
Btw, you write very well.
I also agree with Countr that healthcare is much worse than years ago (makes me wonder what Obamacare will do it?) and we must reluctantly advocate for ourselves. As an ex-friend of mine once said, " we need to manage our own illnesses" and I agree 100%. I see MDs just as advisors with opinions and see most of them as incompetents with cases of egomania and apathy.
So, you are certainly not alone but that was an incredibly frustating story to read. I hope you get your meds and, more importantly, get a NEW MD!
Like someone else wrote, I ALWAYS leave with the prescription in my hand. I know how incompetent people in MDs offices are and will screw almost anything up. Fortunately for me, I found a psych nurse back in 1999 for my OCD and GAD and she is great about always handing me my scripts and calling in scripts ASAP when a pharmacy screws things up on rare ocassions (can anyone say "Walmart"?!). But, she is rare these days.
Lastly, when I went to a Canadian MD (they show up from time to time around here) a few years ago about possibly having CFS, he totally ignored my phys pain and symptoms and all he wanted to talk about was my OCD and asked me if I would take a med he might find on line, if I had not taken it already. I have been to the best OCD shrinks in my area, read many books on the subject, maybe a 100 articles and been on support groups for OCD but a GP thought he knew more than me and the OCd experst I had seen. I walked out and never went back.
Good for you for fighting back, good luck to you and hope you find a better MD and staff very soon.
Anyway, meant to write "SOME" people are incompetent in MD's office and not all nurses are idiots.
Also, it is not uncommon for OCDers to be treated as hypochondriacs eventhough most are not as that Canadian MD did to me. Common misconception.
I have a feeling that there is now a large 8.5 x 11 page stapled to my patient file that says TROUBLE on it now. I suspect that I have ruffled feathers. Bottom line...........we can't walk into someone's offices and go through their paper work, walk from desk to desk, track things and see what is making the process go from successful to s.....crap. When I go in they no longer have an asst. in the room during the exam. She used to record all pertinent information during the visit, she was "support, memory and provided follow through." Without this in place during my visits, the whole process is going down hill, landing in rocky sludge.
I noticed that they do the whole thing half way. They might remember to take your B.P. but not your temperature and weight. They don't seem to either remember or simply choose not to do a lot of normal follow through. I will get labs done and they don't have them ready for review. I have to request that information. They seem to dismiss it..........they require regular lab work and should provide follow through info.
I'm not altogether sure what the deal is..........if it's $$$ problems, staffing problems, the doctor is struggling for whatever reasons.........many of them are very nice and this doctor has gone to bat for me many times over the course of being ill. I first met her in 1998..........and she helped me in ways that others were seemingly unable to period.
A better solution is warranted and I have promised to take off my frustrated cape and just chill..............bottom line I did finally get my medicine and I am walking and moving much better now. Without it I really struggle...........so for now things are on track. If only it did not require such time/effort/frustration to get something so simple.
Patient care is their business so while things can be a little off sometimes overall they need to give you the feeling that they have your back...........many practitioners and their staff do..........it's a very different thing when chronic illness creates a professional patient profile. Nothing I ever wanted to be..........hugs for listening. Blessings for your week!