Murphy's Law in Healthcare

One thing I can’t get over is the incompetence in our healthcare system. We have the best technology at our fingertips, yet we’ve wrapped it up in so much red tape and bureaucracy that it takes forever to get the help you need.

Literally minutes after I hit publish on yesterday’s health update, I got a call from my doctor’s office. The office manager gave me the phone number to call and make an endocrinology appointment.

Yay! Or so I thought.

I called immediately after I got off the phone with her, so happy to finally have some direction.

The phone rang. And rang. And rang.

That happened all the way up until they closed and I got that recording. So I tried again first thing this morning. Same thing.

So my husband, being amazing as he is, called the main line and got transferred to the department’s supervisor. She was a kind woman who informed me that the referral in the system was for GI, not endocrinology.

I would have completely lost it except I think she could hear the desperation in my voice. She gave me her direct fax number and told me to have my doctor’s office send her my paperwork and she’d enter it urgently.

So I called my doctor’s office, who insisted the paperwork that was sent over was marked endocrinology. She said she’d fax it over to the number I gave her right away.

Murphy’s Law in My Life

Right now I feel like my life is the epitome of Murphy’s Law: Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.

I’m praying that getting my referral marked urgent will get me in to see an endocrinologist sooner rather than later.

The ear pain I mentioned yesterday still hasn’t let up. And I’m having bouts of vertigo because of it (I’ve dealt with vertigo since I was 22). Not fun.

All I want is to get in to see a doctor that has the power to help me. Apparently only specialists hold that power these days.

It’s a sad state when our general doctors have no power to order tests and get their patients help in a timely fashion. They’ve simply moved into a triage role for specialists and the insurance companies have them stuck there.

I don’t blame my doctor for this mess. She’s caught up in the bureaucracy the same as I am.