When you choose a doctor or other health professionals make sure you also feel personally comfortable with them. This is is something I advocate without reserve.

I will share a few scenarios while growing up that had great impact, such that I was able years later to trust and act on my instincts, in order to get proper medical care for me, my children and other family members.

Do you remember the first time you challenged the subscribed to voices of authority? At seventeen I became a vegetarian, much to my father’s chagrin. And coming of legal age the next year I was able to pick and choose a doctor of my own volition.

Born in 1953, I am a part of a generation with a legacy for challenging established ideology, speaking out in masses, and protesting peacefully to reform many social and political injustices. The era I grew up in also experienced a surge of consciousness regarding women’s health care, which came to the forefront in the early 70’s. This was perfect timing for me. I had communal and global support to question, discuss and decide how best to care for myself. (It is a sad and disturbing side note that in this year 2021, in certain states, women’s health care rights and the right to terminate a pregnancy have been obliterated!)

My parents and older relatives were products of the Silent Generation, so when my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer at the tender age of thirty, she had far less say in her treatment plan. My grandmother brought her to another physician for a second opinion. This doctor didn’t see any cancer, so my naive mother encouraged by her mother in denial, decided to choose a doctor who missed the cancer. My mother started treatment a year later. By then the cancer had metastasized… Had she had the option to further discuss treatments and choose a doctor on her own, I wonder how she would have fared? Many years after my mother’s passing my grandmother expressed remorse. I held no grudge nor did I hold her responsible for my mother’s decision. It was a very different time to deal with a very difficult situation.

How do you choose a doctor, strictly by referral from another physician, recommendations from close friends and relatives or a combination of both? Health insurance coverage has dramatically changed over the years. Many plans include an assigned a doctor. So, what do you do when you meet this or that doctor and something about them feels wrong? Perhaps it is something they say or just their general demeanor? Most of us have learned to be compliant and not question the professionals. Instead we over question and doubt our self, especially because we lack medical training and expertise. Yet being proactive fending for and protecting you and your loved ones, is a battle worth fighting.

I remember meeting with the attending psychiatrist shortly after my father was hospitalized. My father suffered from depression. Years before he had a similar episode, which I learned after the fact from my aunt and uncle, whom he stayed with. This time ironically I was employed in a hospital and knew enough to ask for a list of medications he was on. When I entered the room my father was catatonic. Ashen, it looked as if death was looming over him. The meds list I received was lengthy, containing more than one anti-psychotic including Thorazine. I called and conferred with a dear nurse friend prior to speaking with this doctor. The psychiatrist sat tipped back in his oversized leather chair with his feet crossed on his desk. I silently noted his nonchalance and “Laisse faire” attitude, and candidly stated that I felt my father was being overmedicated. I indicated which medicines and doses I wanted reduced and as well as the elimination of Thorazine. A bit thrown of his rocker, yet not enough to upset his pompous and condescending attitude, the doctor asked whether I was medically trained and how much I knew about pharmaceuticals. Without blinking I said, “Enough to know it’s too much and by the way, “How well do you know my father? I’ve known him nearly thirty years.” The psychiatrist paused, nodded and did what I asked. Within 24 hours my father was responsive! It took several days to medically and therapeutically move him through this impasse, but at least he had better faculties to think with.

In re-telling the vignettes about my children I am reminded that each also includes dealing with doctors who were callous and arrogant. I opted out of each deciding instead to choose a doctor who had empathy.  Even with prior experience confronting medical professionals, remaining clear headed when your children’s health is involved, is a trickier course to transverse. We have a right to choose a doctor we feel comfortable with and make healthcare and welfare a collaborative effort. Researching alternatives is not unreasonable nor is asking as many questions as you need to fully understand.

My son had a tooth embedded high in his gums. The orthodontist could not apply braces until the tooth was lowered and aligned with the others. The orthodontist referred us to an oral surgeon but before leaving, his dental assistant explained what to expect. She said my son would be sedated with anesthesia. He was visibly uncomfortable with this and asked, “Can’t I just have Novocain?” “Usually the doctor likes to have children asleep, but you can ask.” Seventeen at the time, I fully understood his perplexed look and his apprehension. Neither of us are fans of anesthesia unless it is absolutely necessary.

The following week we met with the oral surgeon. Though his office was modern and impressively decorated with state of the art equipment, and many accolades, neither of us had a good vibe about this guy. After a stiff impersonal introduction and a presumptive briefing, my son asked whether he could undergo this minor surgical procedure without being put to sleep. The oral surgeon looked at me first, and then referred to my son rather indignantly! He said under no circumstances would he ever consider doing the surgery without anesthesia, because it was too dangerous and too stressful for a child to be awake. Without pausing to allow for a rebuttal, the doctor reviewed the prep routine for surgery: which included no food or water after dinner, early morning arrival, an hour in surgery plus another hour in recovery, and the rest of the day at home recuperating. I looked over at my son, whose face had paled. I felt my chest tighten like it was wedged between a vice script. I know this feeling well. It is one I consistently experience when something is instinctively wrong.  Standing up to leave I said, “We are going to talk things over and I will call you back when we decide. Perhaps this is a failsafe precaution for children, but my son is seventeen.”

On the car ride home I asked him what he was thinking. “I don’t know mom, he’s the doctor…” “What did you feel? I continued. Did you like him?” “No, I thought he was an arrogant jerk” my son replied. “Let’s talk to another doctor. I didn’t have a good feeling about this doctor either. He may be a great surgeon but liking a doctor is also really important, after all we pay for their services! I will call the oral surgeon who’d worked on me and ask if he works with young adults He was wonderful!”  I called the other doctor’s office that day and in fact his practice included working with people of all ages. We met him and talked over the options. This oral surgeon had nary an issue with administering Novocain or Nitrous gas if my son wanted it. He actually recommended we avoid anesthesia.

On the day of the surgery I picked my son up from school before lunch. He ate breakfast and a light snack at lunch. He was in and out of the doctor’s office in an hour. Everything went splendidly. My son felt good enough to return to school for his afternoon classes!It was a good reminder; when you choose a doctor follow your instincts.… And the cost for this visit including a follow up was $500 as opposed to $1,500 which was the quoted fee from the first oral surgeon office… 

Never in my wildest imagination could I conjure up the living hell of a nightmare, that my daughter and I endured, trying to find a doctor to properly diagnose and treat her! Over a two year period, which started when she was seven, she was at the mercy of five doctors: two pediatricians, one allergist and two dermatologists including the Chief of Pediatric Dermatology at one of the Bay Area’s most prestigious medical centers/ teaching universities, all of whom misdiagnosed and prolonged what could have been treated and abated in two weeks.

The allergist was quite obnoxious. After one too many office visits, he told me to go home, relax and have a glass of wine. This may have also been the same night he failed to return my emergency call, on a night he was on call because he was in the movie theater celebrating his son’s birthday while my daughter was having a severe reaction to one of the medications he prescribed.

Committed and insistent on their assumption that my daughter had Atopic Dermatitis/ Eczema each doctor in their own right ignored my observations, dismissed my questions, poked, prodded and in total prescribed twenty three different medications, all of which only made her worse. My poor girl was in such excruciating pain. Baths sent her into writhing screams because her skin was so raw, tender and infected. It was unbearable seeing her suffer! And still with an indomitable spirit she carried on, going to school and playing as best she could, like any other child.

I was damned and determined to figure out what she had on my own. Utterly exhausted, I literally dropped to my knees and prayed. I had an amazing revelation! Inside my head I heard, “This is systemic not topical.” Onto the computer I went researching systemic rashes. I also sifted through many Google images until I found information and pictures of children with Herpes Zoster/ Shingles.

In the days that followed I consulted with our old beloved pharmacist, for something I could use to dry the blisters and sores, and then I reached out to the one trusty worthy doctor I knew, my Ob-Gyn.

He agreed to see my daughter and listened intently to what I said. I brought stock copies of images I found that mirrored the progression of her rashes. He asked if any blood work had been drawn to test her titers. I showed him the blood test results I had.

In the entire rigmarole she was put through the worst assault was delivered by the last doctor we visited; the honored and revered expert chief of all chiefs, who flipped up her dress in a fleeting glance, skimmed and skipped over blood test results that indicated there was a problem and lied, saying he reviewed everything. He whisked us in and out the door giving us no more than five minutes of his coveted time. The Physician’s Assistant assured me that Dr. Yahdee Dahdee’s methods were, “tried and true” for Eczema. 

 As we left I requested the lab results be forwarded to my home and read through them with a dentist friend of mine. The results clearly showed her titers were elevated for Herpes Zoster with a recommendation to retest within a 2-3 week window of time. The time had elapsed but my OB-Gyn said we could still check her blood. In July when first drawn the reading was 1.63*H and by August it had risen to 3.31*H! Doc prescribed an antiviral medication which hit the nail on the head. A day later 80% of her rash had dried within a week it was completely gone. It took much longer for the post herpetic neuralgia to dissipate…

Had I not trusted my instincts and followed up with researching on my own I shudder to think how things would have panned out. When you choose a doctor strive to find someone you have confidence in. They hold our life in their hands.

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