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health
update
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VERY
bad
news.
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Okay now that I've calmed myself down, I can tell you guys.
(If you want just the short version - scroll down)
To those of you unaware of my health problems: after being told for a half a year I had a sprained ankle and should "move it more" by my doctor, eventually a cast followed for 3 weeks, after which my skating slowly was returning to normal - last november I was doing salchows again without swelling or pain after... However, then I twisted my foot. I was sent to the physical therapist, however, those sessions only rapidly worsened my condition and eventually the PT wrote a letter to my doctor that I should be sent to the hospital. The Dutch health care system is such that you need a note from your doctor to go to a hospital (officially, no, but the hospital makes no appointments without), and also, you can't really change your doctor (officially you can, but doctors agreed between each other not to take on other doctor's patients unless they're from an other town). Now, after much arguing with my doctor he still refused to send me to the hospital - I could still walk at this point - and sent me to a podotherapist instead. This helped nothing at all, and in july or so, I was basically crying and begging him to send me to the hospital, but he refused to even look at my leg - which was hot and swollen. He suggested I "smear something on it", like "massage cream", and "take something" like "naproxen or ibuprofen". We went to the Ukraine and there the doctors said it was quite serious and prescribed corticosteroid and non-steroid (diclofenac) anti-inflammatories. Back home, this time on crutches cuz I couldn't walk at all anymore, I went to my physician with my mother, who threw a giant scandal in the office. He did sign the note to send me to the hospital, but NOT to a surgeon like I wanted, he refused to do that. Instead he sent me to the rheuma-specialist - I had to wait for the appointment about three months - and he found nothing wrong with me, and sent me to recovery therapy - I got an appointment in the end of january, this was another 3 months or so.
Meantime, my podotherapist had also conceded that she was powerless to help me and wrote ANOTHER letter to the doctor, suggesting I be sent to a SURGEON in the HOSPITAL. This time, the doctor agreed, reluctantly. I was to the surgeon yesterday.
SHORT VERSION:
He said I have something called post-traumatic dystrophy. A birth trauma to my leg nerve was much worsened by the physiotherapy and the like - I should never even have been sent there, I should have been treated for it immediately!
Best case scenario: it will take years for me to recover. Worst case scenario, I've got "cold" dystrophy for which chances of ever recovering at all are about 10%... MRI scans and the like are still coming up (in 3 weeks) to see if there may be anything else wrong but I'm pretty convinced he's right.
For those of you wondering whether or not I can sue the doctor - in the Netherlands? Nah. Under the Dutch system, doctors are virtually unaccountable for malpractice and even if they are, their licenses are very rarely taken away permanently even in the case of sexual abuse of patients, let alone something like this. More-over, damages for accidentally cutting off the wrong leg are 5000 here as far as I know, and immaterial damages can not be claimed except in some rare cases. So basically it'd make no sense to sue.
So anybody who's got an ear with God or other higher deities - I'd much appreciate if you'd put in a good word for me. I'm gonna need it.
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(VISITOR) AUTHOR'S NAME
Selma
MESSAGE TIMESTAMP
08 february 2009, 04:47:42
AUTHOR'S IP LOGGED
77.251.150.41
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