Your doctors are a bunch of #%&*ing idiots

[Denray]

My brother-in-laws quote above.

In early May my dentist had me see an oral surgeon to remove a bump on the roof of my mouth that had been there 6 months. The OS had his buddy in LA do the pathology. I have cancer. The OS says the good news is that it is low grade and even if they have to remove some bone he can make me a rubber plug so I wont sound funny when I talk. The OS says, "It's no big deal, don't loose any sleep over this". WTF.

I get the CT scans asap to see if it was the tip of the iceberg, which it usually is. Then I hear from folks about how dangerous this deal is and that nobody in our area knows what they are doing. Better go to the San Fran area for med help. I'm feeling really good now!

I contact my family doctor for his opinion and he says go see the local Ears, Nose, Throat guy. I do and by then the CT is back and shows no other areas involved and no rubber plug needed. Schedules me up for surgery to remove extra material around the biopsy sight. Once that is done I just need to come back once a year for 5 years and I should be 95% clear of it.

I was so freaked going in for surgery that I could hardly talk right. The idea that I had cancer in my head and they're going to scoop it out. Once on the table I told them I felt like I was going into the gas chamber. They put me out instantly after that.

So they had follow up pathology done to be sure they removed all of the cancerous tissue. Oh wait a minute, it looks like you don't have any cancer. They got a hold of the original biopsy slide and said none there either. To be sure they sent all their info to Stanford Medical Center and they concurred.

Yipee, aren't you happy Mr. Waters? And you only had to pay an 8k deductible.

Had I let the OS do the surgery he would have used the same pathologist and they would have said looking good and keep coming back for the next 5 years.

Had the ENT simply checked the original slide with the pathologist they use there never would have been the surgery.

The End

P.S. I finally made it to page 200 in Hansen's new electrical book.

[Marc]

The bump, benign as it was, would not have needed removal?

American medicine ain't what it used to be. Glad you're fine.

Marc

[Denray]

It was a swollen salivary gland. The ENT trusted the first doc's path report. Whoops.

[kurt]

wo wo wo......

I give medical folks a lot of benefit of the doubt because it really is a complicated bit of work they're involved in, but geez....they shoulda done better.

That's a lot of deductible to have to chew on for their dipsquat incompetence.

Glad it's OK, I've had a few of those scares myself....it's stressful.

[Mark P]

I might be talking to a lawyer.

[Steven Hockstein]

I might be talking to a lawyer.

That is why our insurance rates are so high.

How about going to talk to the doctor that made the error and asking for your money back. Tell him that you think it is the right thing to do and you prefer not to go the legal route. Maybe you will be surprised with a refund check and a release to sign.

Sorry for your scare but at least it is good news in the end.

[Denray]

The original pathologist office manager basically said they were right and the other two were wrong. They are 500 air miles away in LA.

I'm going for the OS that used them next.

Might end up being a small claims court thing. But, hey, something to do.

I don't come back to bed at 3am and think about cancer anymore or this fork up. I think of ski wrecks, drowning on the river, occasional wife issues, and my business. Not necessarily in that order. Rarely this deal. So, what the heck. I'm going to follow it thru to SCC, I think. But will contact docs first.

Lawyers have told me I don't have enough damages to be worth their time. After all I am pretty much making a complete recovery.

[Rob Amaral]

Man... that stinks.. 'the future' I'm afraid.. it's going downhill...

[Denray]

Whoa. I received a letter from the errant pathologist insurance company. Stay tuned. [:-thumbu]