I am not good with stress

OK, so the surprise CT scan is done, and it is a relief to know it’s on its way to my doctor.

I'm slightly embarrassed to report, however, that I pretty much had a meltdown in the hospital this morning.

Got there at the appointment time to find that yes, I was on their books as a result of my doctor’s call but no, there was no order from the doctor to have the CT scan done. No written order, no scan. I tried arguing that my doctor obviously wanted me to have the scan because she called over to set up the appointment. Which they acknowledged. But they said that the doctor must also fax over a written order. Which they didn’t have. Or couldn’t find.

So, they paged my doctor, who was unavailable, but talked to Dr. W., who is the official doctor on call for that group this weekend. Dr. W., in an act which truly defines crappy customer service reported that since I was Dr. K’s patient, and not her own patient, she would not fax over the order. Nor would she look at my file so she could independently determine that I needed the scan and order it. When I heard that I was apoplectic.

What the hell is the point of having a GROUP doctor on call if she will only service her own patients??!!?!? What the hell does ON CALL mean if you just say "no thanks, I pass" when you are called??

When the person at the hospital told me that they would not do the scan, I lost it.

I explained, through sobby tears, that I was leaving *tomorrow* for a business trip and had to get the test done today, Saturday. The whole reason I had driven all the way to their hospital is that the hospital in the county where I live could not do this on a Saturday.

I wasn't angry or yelling, just kind of pathetically begging -- I'd been fasting since I woke up (no food, no water), waiting for hours while you all try to find the orders, and now you are telling me I have to just go home, even though YOU KNOW my doctor ordered the test??

It was really crazy. I knew if I didn't get the scan, I knew I'd spend the whole trip obsessing about whether I was going to die from lung cancer. I stepped outside to try to pull myself together and when I came back I suggested that they call my other doctor – who wasn’t the one who ordered the test, but who knew the situation. So they paged and called Dr. N.

Dr. N. wasn't responding to the page and I was determined to sit there until they had mercy on me. Finally, the gal behind the desk suggested that I go down to the emergency room, have a doctor see me there, and (hopefully) write up an order for a CT scan.

I was so over trying to explain how ludicrous that was - a total waste of the ER staff’s time, my money, my insurance company’s money, my time, etc. So I just trudged down there, and had to talk to 4 people to make someone understand that no, I didn’t have an emergency, nor did I need treatment – I just needed an order.

I was still sitting in the Triage Nurse’s office when a call came from the Radiology department – FINALLY, something good happened! Dr. N. (bless her heart!) had answered the page and agreed to write the order. How nice was that??? Amazingly nice, I tell you. Restored my faith in doctors, which had seriously eroded in the previous hours.

At that point I burst into tears AGAIN. And I’m telling you, I don’t really cry. I cry like, maybe 2 times a MONTH. But today was all about the waterworks. I think this time, I was just relieved that I could finally be allowed to do the damn scan.

Of course, it is Saturday, and Dr. N. was home with her family, with no fax machine. She tried a couple of times to email a scanned order, but it didn’t work, so she actually went to Kinko’s and faxed it in. This all took about another hour.

So finally, they let me in to take the test. The tech was super nice, but had to stab me FOUR times in different places to get a vein for the IV, which was a bit of a drag. At this point, I was just trying to stay calm while he just kept jabbing around for a vein. I must have looked a little whacked, through, because he kept looking at me with a worried expression and asking "you alright?" every 2 minutes. He had to wrap my arm in a hot blanket to get a vein to show up.

Finally he got it, shot me up with the toxic sludge and ran me through the CT scanner. That part took all of 8 minutes. I kid you not.

Now I’m home, listening to the painters banging around in my house while I sit outside on the back porch thanking God that my little jaunt to the hospital is over.

I’ll keep y’all posted on the results, but it’s gonna be a few days. :-(