Resceduled Appointments for chronic pain pataints

[alex44]

Help me folks - for about the third time, our Doctor's office has called at the 11th hour, (so to speak) to tell us that our appointments have to be resceduled. As i noted at the beggining of the post, this is NOT the first time this has happened. We were offered an alternitive doctor, but based on experiance, another doctor may or may NOT continue our current regiman as I am on what many opoidphobic doctors consider too high dose 180mg. Morphine 90Mg. BID. my S/O is on about half that but is under medicating her. The point being, how can a PM Doc. justify changing or wanting to rescedule an appointment at the last minute. how in the H***
can a PM doctor do this, this has caused no end of stress on us, we do not have a rainey day stash, we are just tired. Please, comments, ASAP, as I need some support here. things are tough enough, Our A/C is shot, they may or may not turn off our power, social agencys, bless their hearts, are doing their best, but to get ANY help is a nightmare, it should not be easy, but to make someone jump through 100 hoops, IMHO, is not right.

Blessings
Alex44
skypilot

[Kathi49]

Alex, I feel for you. I don't know if what I am about to say will help or not but I was in much of the same situation for the last several months. My wonderful PM doctor evidently has had some kind of surgery...I think. He has spinal disorders also so that is why I think he must have had something done. And no one seems to know when he will be back. In any case, I met with the alternate doc who was just fine. But I did go ahead and switch my records over to my mothers pain doctor who I also know to be very good. It was getting more and more difficult to drive the distance anyway and this new doc is just up the road. Long story. So, I guess I would say to go ahead and meet with the alternate doc. I would think the alternate doc would have your records and wouldn't sway from prescribing what you need. I can't say for sure. I just wanted to provide some support and relay what I experienced from many cancelled scheduled appointments. I wish you the best because I know it has been difficult for me; not so much medication just the fact that a lot of time elapsed.

[tortoisegirl]

I would be surprised if the substitute doctor wouldn't continue for current treatment for this one appointment...much different than transferring to a new clinic/doctor. Seems like that is your only choice. Scheduling problems can happen often in a doctor's office...if a doctor gets sick, even if there are a few doctors in the practice, that is a big percent they then need to try to re-schedule, and with opiates, they usually need to do it in a couple day window. Everyone has times where last minute things pop up, even doctors. The way I see it, they are trying to accommodate you. If this really has been happening more than a couple times a year, unless they have some extenuating circumstance they have explained to you, it may be time to find a new clinic.

Unfortunately, we often have to put up with these hoops to get treatment. These sorts of problems are a good reason to build up a rainy day stash, even if it is only a few days of a short acting med. I've had to see substitute doctors a few times and they always continued my meds, although one did comment he very much disagreed with it. Even if they did decide to drop your dose, they couldn't conceivably do very much in one month without sending you into withdrawal. Best wishes.

[Mark N]

alex sorry to0 hear about this problem cropping up again. I agree that I don't know how a "pain" doctor could delay knowing it put chronic pain patients in a bind. Is there a chance that your doctor could set up a substitute for the times she can't make your appointment. This doctor wouldn't take over your care just prescribe your medication so that you wouldn't be without medication for days at a time. Other than that I don't know of an answer that would help you as it isn't easy to come up with a new doctor to replace one that you are seeing now. I hope she will work with you to provide this safety net so you don't suffer needlessly. Sorry this is happening to you but often doctors aren't as aware as they should be about the impact their delays cause their patients.

[Eva 14]

Alex, you really have my sympathy. I once saw a doctor for a very serious medical condition, and the stupid clinic was re-scheduling my appointments left and right! It was a life-threatening illness, too, so I was already stressed out beyond belief. Plus, my parents live out of town and came into town specifically to drive me to my appointments----only to have appointment after appointment randomly changed at the last minute! I was furious, confused, angry, stressed---I couldn't believe that they would treat a cancer patient so shabbily!

I ended up leaving that stupid clinic and never looking back. Everything about that clinic was a total MESS, and this is with good insurance. That had to have been the most STRESSFUL ordeal I've ever been through! I felt so vulnerable and powerless, both with the cancer AND with the constant last-minute re-scheduling of appointments. NO doctor should treat a patient this way! What if the patient were to cancel at the last minute? The patient would end up having to PAY for the missed appointment.

I hope that you can find a pain doctor who will treat you with RESPECT and not keep changing your appointment times on you. Even though we are ill, we still have our own lives to live! I too pray that you will find a pain doc who is NOT opiophobic, as 180 mg of mophine per day really isn't that high of a dose. (I take more than that). I would definitely suggest that you try to find an alternate pain doctor.

By the way, I've been seeing my current pain doc for nearly 4 years. In that time, he has never ONCE canceled or re-scheduled an appointment on me. And I always make sure to show up for my appointments on time, to show him the same respect that he shows me.

Good luck finding a new pain doctor, or finding a pain doc who can cover for your other doctor (if that's even allowed; I don't know all of the regulations). But if a patient is upfront and honest with their doctor about asking for a pain doctor to "cover" for your canceled appointments, I really don't see how the doctor could get mad about that). Again, I'm not an expert at the legalities, though.

Best Wishes,
Eva