Pain Dr. Released Me :( - Pain Management Message Board

bulletinboard25 · 03-11-2006, 12:32 AM

As the title states, my pain management doctor released me.

I'll try to make this story short.

I had my first appointment the last week of February with the doctor... the consult went fine, everything went well.. etc. etc... Prescribed Duragesic 25mcg/hr every 72 hours and 75mg of Lyrica 3x/day.

As you all know, I was non-opiate tolerant, so when I read the "not for use in non-opiate tolerant" patients I become a little concerned. Asked you all about it, called a nurse on Friday who was a complete jerk and said "fine don't take it..." when all I was doing was asking a question.

I had started the Lyrica the day I picked up the script, which was a day after my appointment.

I had to wait until the following Monday to speak to my nurse (the one who was actually there in the room). The nurse said that I will be fine, etc etc....

But I was having some strong dizziness from the Lyrica and was more drowsy than I usually was. The pharmacist had said that if I started both medicines at the same time, I'd be overly drowsy. Someone on here mentioned the same thing.. don't start both at the same time, so you can adjust to one and if you had a bad reaction you'd know which one caused it.

I'm 25 and still in college (slow I know)... and I had midterms that week and I didn't want to be overly sedated or completely unable to concentrate and fail my tests or do poorly... So I thought I'd wait until my spring break (march 6th, which just so happened to be my b-day) to start the patch and I'd have the whole week to adjust to it.

Fast-forward to Monday, March 6th. Put the patch on in the PM. About 14 hours after putting it on I started to get violently ill. Vomiting, nausea beyond belief, and just the weirdest feeling in the world. I have my girlfriend call the nurse to let them know what's going on and to see what I should do.. She tells me to take the patch off, wait 4 days.. and try again. We say okay. Obviously she knew it was the first time I'd put on the patch, and my girlfriend explained the reasoning beyond waiting. She was fine with it.

2 hours later, I walk downstairs... Go downstairs and gf says to me... The nurse just called and the doctor said he doesn't want to treat you anymore because you waited 8 days to put on the patch.

Basically I was DEVESTATED. My GI doctor was the one who referred me there, and they are friends who work in the same hospital. So it's not like I can go ask GI to refer me to another pain management clinic now, because GI doesn't want to see me.

I don't have a primary care physican because my GI pretty much acted like my PCP and I hadn't had any other health issues requiring me to go to a PCP for the 7 years i'd been seeing the GI.

I'm at a loss as to what to do now....

I have been through the ringer with medications, and pain management seemed like the EXACT answer I was looking for.

I can't just refer myself... and I don't know what to do. He literally broke my heart. Now I have to sit here and suffer.... It's 2:30am and I'm in pain. My GF's asleep and I sit here for the first time in my life depressed, because I don't have anything I can do right now to provide me any relief. I have such a heavy feeling in my chest right now. My quality of life is non-existant. I've been pretty much house-bound for over a year.

I'm so down. No doctor. No where to turn. I really don't want to have to go through another year with a PCP or GI waiting for them to refer me after they try all the medications I've tried. I don't want to have to start over. It would be taking steps backward to go to a PCP....

I just don't know what I can do... I can't make an appointment with a PCP and say hey, here's my charts, refer me to a pain management place, because I'd doubt he'd even do it.

I had NO IDEA the doctor would do this for waiting 8 days to put on the patch because I had midterms and I wanted to put it on during spring break when I could have the days to adjust. Luckily I waited, because it made me feel so ill I would have failed my midterms... but I'm down I waited because now I'm suffering without meds, without a doctor, and without any idea of what I'm going to do.

Anyone out there have advice or can offer anything to me. Please! I've waited to post this for awhile because I haven't felt like doing anything. I'm just so confused.

duttin · 03-11-2006, 12:00 PM

BB,

happy belated birthday,don't beat yourself up over the pain med DR.You with held the patch for vary valid reasons.My pain med DR won't see me any more over that I refused lumbar injections.It didn't help,he hit a nerve and my back didn't even hurt.

Find yourself a good family physician,write down everything you tried and go from there.

the first time I went to Pain Medicine and management,it scared the crap out of me.There had to of been 50 people there.All had appointments around the same.

I am going to the pain clinic at the cleveland clinic and then my family physican will follow-up there after.

Don't deprive yourself of medical attention,your GI doc should still see you,you have been with him for 7 years,it shouldn't make a difference if they are friends or not.give him a call

Toni

conductor · 03-11-2006, 12:56 PM

Dear Bulletinboard25,

Frankly, this whole situation sucks!

About a year ago, my Mom got "scolded", rather loudly, by a nurse at our physician's office because she called to get her Rx's of MS Contin and Percocet 4 days early--due to the fact that my parents were leaving on vacation.

My Mom, who reacted very emotionally, wrote a letter of apology to the doctor. Well, it turned out that the doctor had no idea of the incident. Simply, that particular nurse (who doesn't work there any more) was routinely rude.

Well...I had an appointment the next day (after my Mom hand-delivered the note), and the doctor handed me my Mom's prescriptions. The doctor also apologized all over the place for the misunderstanding.

So...you never know how the message comes across to the doctor from the person who delivers it!!

Maybe you could try something like this if you are comfortable with it.

Keep all of your records at YOUR disposal--just in case you do find someone who will treat you immediately.

Sincerely,
Jon (Conductor)

bulletinboard25 · 03-11-2006, 04:42 PM

Thanks all for the kind words.

In this time of complete and utter depression (or sadness I guess) I have just been searching for different ideas.

The nurse said it came directly from the doctor's mouth, so I don't know if writing a letter would do much good, and I'm not exactly sure the doctor would take into consideration my concerns with a letter. I guess I could try.

The GI won't see me because of what happened with the PMD. I'm sure all he said was "didn't follow my instructions.." which to the outsider could mean any # of things, namely (I would think) overusing the medication... Not "underusing".

Do you think a PCP (my family visits) would look at my charts and refer me upon my first visit to him if I pour my soul out to him?

I called the only other Pain Management Clinic in my area thats within 5+ hours, and they require a referral.. so that's what I'm going to have to do.

Last night I soooo badly wanted to go to the ER because I was in so much pain, but I didn't because of the fact my insurance basically SUCKS.... and I doubt very seriously I could have afforded the visit.

Heres the ONLY things I have planned so far)

1. Visit with my family's PCP (I've never been) Tuesday Mar. 14th. Bring my charts, and plead with him for a referral....

2. POSSIBLY writing a letter to the old PMD, although I'm not even sure he'd take the time to read it.

3. Nothing else... But being heart broken... and in pain

. I hate staying up all night suffering... It's getting so hard. I lose my appetite, and have lost 45-65lbs in 2 years. 6'0'' 145lbs. now.

Thanks for showing sympathy. Like I said, I had no idea that this thing would happen.

ARANGER · 03-11-2006, 06:40 PM

Hey BB25,

Sorry to hear about what happened. I can see if you overused the meds, but not using them because of side effects seems like an odd reason to drop you from the clinic.

I would request your records ASAP from the PM clinic. Maybe find yourself another PCP if you can. Explain what happened and in no way is this drug abuse, if anything you were reluctant to use a stronger med and you suffered side effects.

As someone else mentioned, write everything down as to what happened. If I remember correctly, you had a previous post regarding the patch and received advise from many of us. You may want to print it out as well to show that you were trying to find out about this med. A PCP should be able to see that it is just the opposite of drug abuse. You may have not followed instructions, but you were having side effects that probably warranted dicontinuing the med temporarly. You called the PM clinic and spoke with a rude nurse. At least you made an attempt to contact the Dr.

I would be frustrated too. If you can't go to your current PCP, I would be looking for another one. Be sure to get all your records and check for accuracy. It would be interesting to see what the Dr had to write about you in the end.

Good luck, hope you are able to get into a Dr soon. Take Care