Visiting GP after surgery

[Taxing Matters]

Could it be an insurance requirement?

Not likely. No health insurance policy I've ever had or read imposed that kind of requirement.

 

[quincy]

It is generally best to first address all questions about a surgery to the doctor who performed the surgery. The surgeon has a vested interest in the outcome of the surgery. No surgeon, in other words, wants another doctor to second guess what he did.

Only if the surgeon cannot or will not address the concerns of the patient adequately should another doctor/surgeon be consulted.

 

[Zigner]

It is generally best to first address all questions about a surgery to the doctor who performed the surgery. The surgeon has a vested interest in the outcome of the surgery. No surgeon, in other words, wants another doctor to second guess what he did.

Only if the surgeon cannot or will not address the concerns of the patient adequately should another doctor/surgeon be consulted.

Yes, this. This is, in essence, what I was going to post.

 

[Msradell]

I may have confused everybody or everyone just got confused because of how broken up my responses were but here's a chain of events what happened:
⦁ last August my wife fell in thought she sprained her ankle
⦁ after a couple of weeks went with getting better she went to her GP who looked at it thought it was just a bad sprain or possibly a pooled ligament
⦁ in October it still wasn't getting much better so he did an x-ray, thought he saw a small fracture so he sent her to an orthopedic surgeon
⦁ she visited that orthopedic surgeon, he took some x-rays and a CT scan and said that she had a LivFrank fracture.
⦁ She's envisaging for a 2nd appointment to discuss surgery
⦁ a couple weeks after that appointment she got a call from a different doctor setting up an appointment for her surgery, no mention of why this change made was told to her.
⦁ In her initial meeting with the 2nd surgeon she asked about possible complications etc. and he said he had never had a problem and had done the surgery multiple times
⦁ Since it was near the end of the year and the holidays 3 rescheduled for February.
⦁ She had surgery and things went okay as far she could tell, she was in a splint for 3 weeks but all the no major issues.
⦁ However at this point things were going great, the healing was very slow in the foot kept bleeding and hurting.
⦁ The surgeon sent her for a CT scan at an outpatient clinic but during your next visit said it didn't show anything.
⦁ She continued to make little progress and finally in the center for 2nd CT scan.
⦁ While she was getting the scan done she asked them for a copy of the write up for the 1st scan in the write up said that the hardware is loose and that there was a possible infection
⦁ when she went back to the surgeon who did the surgery after this CT scan he said they with an infection in the hardware needed to come out.
⦁ He scheduled a 2nd surgery, took the hardware out and put her back in a splint
⦁ she is now on a 6 week antibiotic regime
⦁ through all of this is surgeon has never said anything about what happened, how it happened etc. it's like giving your assurances prior to the surgery he's done many of these and has never had a problem!
⦁ We've been paying caregivers to come to your home ever since the 1st surgery and are going broke doing it.

The surgeon has basically become noncommunicative with my wife and I! We are still extremely frustrated about the GP because she had an appointment for her annual physical that he is now refusing to do?

 

[cbg]

What is the goal here? What outcome would satisfy your wife that she was being treated appropriately?

That's a real question, not a rebuttal to your statements. It makes a difference what I recommend, or if I make a recommendation.

 

[Msradell]

That her foot is healed would be an acceptable outcome! That Dr. has been very noncommunicative and obviously of hiding information that he already had such as a loose hardware which he ignored for 3 months before removing it, the infection that he also ignored for 3 months etc. He has been an extremely poor communicator putting it mildly. Last visit he actually told my wife that her foot is healing and he may have to remove it!! Of course we don't even know why my wife was referred to him from the other orthopedic surgeon. This 1 have good credentials but...

At the very least we want to be told what's happening what I don't believe he's telling her, he is just hiding many of the facts!

 

[quincy]

That her foot is healed would be an acceptable outcome! That Dr. has been very noncommunicative and obviously of hiding information that he already had such as a loose hardware which he ignored for 3 months before removing it, the infection that he also ignored for 3 months etc. He has been an extremely poor communicator putting it mildly. Last visit he actually told my wife that her foot is healing and he may have to remove it!! Of course we don't even know why my wife was referred to him from the other orthopedic surgeon. This 1 have good credentials but...

At the very least we want to be told what's happening what I don't believe he's telling her, he is just hiding many of the facts!

Your wife needs to address these concerns with the nurse practitioner on Wednesday.

Your wife can set up an appointment with a medical malpractice attorney if she feels that the nurse/doctor are avoiding her questions or the answers provided by the nurse/doctor are unsatisfactory. The first consultation with the attorney should be free.

Good luck.

 

[Msradell]

At some point we are at right now, if she doesn't get satisfactory answers we are definitely going to have to pursue other courses of action! Of course that doesn't help the GP situation any.

 

[quincy]

At some point we are at right now, if she doesn't get satisfactory answers we are definitely going to have to pursue other courses of action! Of course that doesn't help the GP situation any.

I recommend your wife waits to see what she learns on Wednesday.

There is a one year statute of limitations for medical malpractice claims. You must file a claim within one year from the date the cause of action arose.

 

[commentator]

"....That her foot is healing and they may have to remove it???????" That's certainly something I would want an answer to, all right!

If she has an infection that's first priority. If she had an infection for several months, well, she's on a six week course of antibiotics, right? Is the infection under control? This could be life threatening. What did they give as the reason they took out the metal in her ankle? Sometimes patients turn out to be allergic to the metal used in such surgeries.

I happen to have some familiarity with these "lisfranc" injuries to the foot/ankle. It's kind of like you thought you had a simple sprained ankle and if it turns out that it is is this kind of injury, it is not something that will heal quickly or can be easily taken care of. From the sound of what you wrote, you began seeing the orthopedic doctors because the assumed " simple sprain" was not getting better in the first place. It's not something that will be easy, the bones have like, changed positions. I know it would've been good if she had healed up right away, but this kind of injury is sort of a pain to treat for all concerned. They may have over-sold you on how much good it would do to have the surgery, or assured you that she'd be as good as new after surgery, but really, this is a sort of major hard to fix problem even if you have the very best of doctoring.

Yes, complete healing is the desired outcome and as soon as possible, since it is so troublesome and expensive for her to be non functioning and mobility impaired. Go to the next meeting with the NP with her and have a list of questions that you want answered thoroughly. Then you'll be better prepared to move forward. Best wishes to you for your wife's complete healing.

 

[stealth2]

I'm reading a lot of what was said but little of what you/your wife actually asked. When the doc said "That her foot is healing and they may have to remove it" did either of you ask what "it" is? Or why?

 

[quincy]

I'm reading a lot of what was said but little of what you/your wife actually asked. When the doc said "That her foot is healing and they may have to remove it" did either of you ask what "it" is? Or why?

The “it” apparently refers to the loose hardware, not the foot.

 

[stealth2]

The “it” apparently refers to the loose hardware, not the foot.

Fair enough.... Odd wording, then.

 

[quincy]

Fair enough.... Odd wording, then.

Msradell is using speech recognition software so what is communicated might not be as clear as it otherwise would be.

Certainly if the doctor is talking about removing the foot, however, another orthopedic surgeon should be consulted immediately. And a medical-malpractice attorney.

 

[Taxing Matters]

Certainly if the doctor is talking about removing the foot, however, another orthopedic surgeon should be consulted immediately. And a medical-malpractice attorney.

I'm unclear why you'd suggest a medical malpractice attorney at this at this stage. If the doctor was recommending removing the foot when it was clearly not necessary under prevailing standards of medical practice that would amount to malpractice. But as the procedure was not done, there seem to be no damages suffered from it. And without damages there is no viable medical malpractice claim and no med-mal attorney would pursue it.