American health care - part deux

There are times that I long for Canadian healthcare inefficiencies. Today, is one of those times. I had a minor surgery on my toe in my regular clinic here in Houston. Let me make it clear, as a Canadian wait times are expected, IN HOSPITALS. I have been waiting for this appointment for approximately six weeks. It took me two weeks to see my PCP (that's primary care physician for the Canadians out there) for a specialist referral, then another three weeks to get an appointment with a podiatrist who "does feet". That's five weeks folks for a procedure that apparently takes fifteen solid minutes.

Anyone else longing for Canadian healthcare where I could have walked into any clinic and had this procedure done virtually on the spot? Did I mention that there would be no forthcoming bill for the service? I fully expect to pay up to 20% of the cost of this fifteen minute procedure and that's with "good" health care. F***ing frightening.

So pleased to have gotten an appointment with an actual podiatrist with whom I could discuss all my treatment options I get a physician who is in such a rush that she screws up my first name on the prescription. The reason she is in such a hurry is because she herself is running late for a doctor's appointment. The irony is palpable.

After proposing that a PA (physician's assistant) could do the minor 15 minute surgery I assure her that this is not happening. I have waited FIVE weeks to see HER, not someone who can't get into medical school. She sighs, looks at me as though I have inconvenienced her to a level that is immeasureable and agrees to do it. I am rethinking my obstinance on this point as I contemplate a speed toenail removal. She freezes my toe, comes back in and does a very professional job. I thank her, take the prescription and all the vast paperwork and leave.

On the way home I decide that I would really like to have the Darvocet and antibiotics sooner rather than later so I stop at a Walgreen's Drugstore. After waiting for 45 minutes I approach the pharmacist and politely ask if my prescription is ready. I am told that I will have to wait for a second time and told that I should know better than to come in the day after Easter Sunday. WTF does Christ's resurrection somehow cause all the crazies to need more meds?

It is at this point that the electricity goes out in the Walgreen's. Then we are told that we will have to leave for safety reasons. I think that the pharmacists were the only ones in danger at this point. I ask (as nicely as possible) to have my prescriptions back so I can get them filled elsewhere. BTW by this point the freezing is starting to go away and having expected some form of pain killer by this point I am almost tempted to liberate a bottle of Advil on the way out the door.

Having been assured by the kind pharmacy people at Walgreen's that my prescriptions are "in the system" and I could go to another location to have them filled, I do so. Everything goes tickety boo and the pharmacist walks up with my prescriptions all nicely packaged to go. My heart lifts and bird song fills the store. For some reason the pharmacist while looking directly at me is calling me Georgia. My heart sinks, the birds all keel over. I explain to the pharmacist with as much patience that I can muster that the doctor had been in a hurry and probably had misheard the name. Now could I please have my drugs?

Oh no, this is not what happened, the pharmacist concerned for MY safety insists on speaking to the doctor to confirm that these drugs really were prescribed to me (and not Georgia), and that they were the correct drugs. While I am sure that in the future I will appreciate his due diligence I could have f***ing killed him at that point in time. He calls my health provider who leaves him on hold for an unusually long period of time (par for the course). I did explain that my doctor wasn't there, that she barely finished bandaging my foot before she bolted for the door, but he insisted. He finally gets through to an afterhours nurse (this is 5:15 in the afternoon) and tells her that he needs the doctor to call the pharmacy before he will give me the prescriptions. We continue to wait for another 25 minutes by which point I can feel every nerve ending in my foot firing up.

He comes over and tells me that they are still waiting for the call but he was sure that it soon come. For some reason his completely unrealistic optimism caused me to start laughing hysterically which quickly turned into tears. I inform him that I am going home to take some pain medication and could they please call me when they would liberate my medications. As of this moment I am still waiting for that call. My only solace is the idea that the pharmacy guy is still sitting by the phone patiently waiting to hear from my doctor.

I only have one thing to say about this experience, hoarding Vicodin from previous surgeries does pay off.