Poisoned Thinking
by a patient
For the past 20 years, I have been living with a little thing called Type 1 diabetes. Because of this wonderful thing, I have had numerous doctor's visits, medical scares and emotional roller-coaster rides. I have to admit that I was in my early twenties. Wearing tight jeans and a cute top was more important to me than my diabetes care. As I've grown older, I have seen the error of my ways then, but at that present time, I was not terribly concerned about who was on my diabetes care team. So I strolled into a clinic that had an elderly gentleman as the head endocrinologist. He had pretty good reviews online and tons of patients, and he had rebelled against transferring all of his paper documents to the online format. I always found this funny because he figured he'd rather pay a huge fine every year than make his nurses transfer all the files. Also, with no electronic tracking, making appointments and keeping track of prescriptions was insanely difficult. I have one very memorable visit to his office that describes this doctor's poisoned thinking perfectly. My appointment was at 8:30 in the morning. I had taken time off from work to make this mid-week appointment and about 30 minutes of waiting in the waiting room...I was getting a little pissed. Not to mention, when I checked into my appointment 15 minutes early, the waiting room was empty, then quickly filled to capacity within those 30 minutes of mind-numbing waiting.
Finally, my name was called. I walked in and was given the once-over by the nurse. My blood pressure was good, blood sugar within range. “Good job little lady! Let's check your A1C...it's 7.2! Way to go! The doctor will be right in.”
Another 15 minutes of waiting went by...and I needed to talk to him to adjust my prescription. Well, the nurse strolled back in and said the doctor wouldn't be able to see me today. Could she help me with whatever else I needed?
Little did she know, the room was right next to his office and I could hear him on the phone with his wife talking about their upcoming vacation. I told her “No, I need to see the doctor today about a prescription change.” So...I waited. And can you believe this man? He had at least 10 patients waiting for what reason? To talk to his wife? Not about an emergency or anything, it was just about what kind of clothing she should pack for their upcoming cruise.
After another stint of waiting, the doctor waltzed in. He had a huge grin on his face, apologized for the wait and said it was always so nice seeing me. Then, he congratulated me on my A1C and began to explain that he loved seeing me because his other patients weren't thin, young, beautiful women. The condescension in this man's voice knew no bounds. He then asked me what I had done for St. Patrick's Day. "A young girl like you should have been out on the town!" he said.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, my endocrinologist hoped that I was drinking and celebrating on one of the most drunken holidays of the year. I told him politely that I didn't have the money to go out and drink, and I'd like to talk to him about a change in my prescription. The thing I had waited so long to talk to him about took all of 5 minutes to resolve. I headed out the door clearly frustrated, followed by his voice saying, "Grab a vial of insulin on your way out!" I think one of the main reasons I put up with this doctor was because I left his office with 1-2 extra vials of Novolog. I was stockpiled for the year.
But after this visit to the endocrinologist of horrors, I did not return.
