Sorry for the horrible pun, but I'm on a lot of pain medication and I'm pretty stressed. This is going to be a long story. I need help with both my injury and the situation I am in. I will do a TIFU style with a TL;DR at the end.
I injured my knee at work July 27th and have been fighting workman's comp, and as of today, my doctors. While lifting a heavy shelf in a walk in refrigerator I twisted my knee. And by heavy I mean, a fully stocked produce shelf upwards of 600lbs. Anyways, there was no loud pop, no instant pain, I just lifted half the shelf, pivoted it, did my cleaning, and went about my day. As the day went on, my knee hurt more and more. It got to the point of barely being able to walk. I went home, assuming it was the weather (monsoon season in Phoenix, AZ) or something equally trivial. Wake up the next day, and the pain is worse. So, I go in, file a claim, and thus begins the uphill battle. First, I went to urgent care. They did the standard, 'Does this hurt? Does that hurt? Okay, lets do x-rays.' The x-rays showed no signs of damage. They suggested if I really was in pain to go to the hospital and have them do an MRI.
So, I drive across the street to my local ER and sign in, wait the couple of hours, and get called back. In triage they do another set of x-rays. They came back clean too. The ER nurse practitioner comes into my room and tells me the same thing I found out 3 hours ago. I ask her about an MRI, and it turns out I'm at the one hospital I've ever been to without an MRI on site. So she gives me a referral to an orthopedic specialist, a prescription for 12 oxycodone, crutches and a knee brace.
About a week later, I go in to see the orthopedic. He tells me they don't have an MRI. He also informs me that because I have no mobility issues with my knee that the brace and crutches are useless and only use them when I feel necessary. Because I'm in pain he gives me 40 (20 days worth with the way he wrote it) hydrocodone, tells me to toss the brace, and that I'll get a call when workman's comp approves the knee MRI. Another two weeks roll by before I get a call about the MRI, the pain is worse, I'm running low on hydrocodone, and workman's comp hasn't paid me a cent. I go in on August 21, get the MRI done, get a copy of the disk, and I'm all excited I will finally have answers and proof of injury so I can get my back pay. Silly me. Appointment is scheduled for September 7th (yesterday).
Last weekend the pain got so bad I couldn't even make it to the bathroom on my own. I had no more pain meds and half a week to go before my appointment. I went back to ER. I go in and get a very different treatment than I got my first visit. I explain my situation, that I'm out of pain meds, when my appointment is, and ask them to help me. After a couple hours they take me back to triage and I hear the nurses at the station talking about me. They are saying how I'm not nearly pale enough and my BP and HR are too low for me to be in pain (138 over 86, 116 bpm). Normally I run 20 lower than those stats. After another half hour of stewing the doctor finally comes back. I give him my situation and he says, "Look. I went over your pharma report and your fills for narcotics make sense. They all occurred after your injury. I'll give you another script for 12 percoset, but you need to make them last til your appointment." Okay? Sure, great, that's what I wanted, but why the harsh treatment? Next door you have a girl that fainted from anemia because she refused her pills, but I get scolded while you're all fawning over her? Whatever.
I go home, drug myself and sleep more than 3 hours for the first time in 4 days.
Yesterday, I took my MRI disk in and saw my orthopedic. Nothing. He sees nothing on my MRI. I've stared at this thing for weeks, and there's several spots I find questionable, but he finds nothing. I'm broken. I ask him what I can do at this point, how am I going to prove to workman's comp that I'm in pain, ect. ect. He tells me he believes I'm in pain, but there's nothing he can do. So he gives me a referral to a pain management specialist. Well, at least he believes me unlike the ER. I go to the front desk to schedule the appointment, and hey, the pain management specialist's PA has an opening the next day (today)! Thank God not everything is shit. Silly me.
Today I go in and I'm so excited to be not in pain that I show up 30 minutes early. Appointment at 1:30, I show up at 1:00, all is well in the world. I sign that my info is up to date, fill out paperwork for the new doctor, and still 20 minutes early. At 2:10, the magic of excitement has faded when I'm finally called into the room to take stats (86 over 58, didn't catch bpm). By 2:30 the frustration has completely replaced all excitement. At 2:40 the PA walks in and greets me. We go over my pain level (3 with percocet and resting, 6 without and resting, 9 while walking without) do a few flexes of the knee to see what hurts, he compares my knees to see I have no swelling. Then it goes downhill fast.
I ask him what we can do since nothing is seen on the MRI. "Well, I can't give you an more narcotics. You have filled scripts from too many different doctors recently. Physical therapy won't really do you any good since walking is what causes your pain to flare. A steroid injection won't do anything since you have no signs of arthritis or inflammation. So, the best I can do is give you a topical anti-inflammatory cream." What the actual fuck? I lost my composure. I ask him, if an injection won't work because I don't have swelling, how will an anti-inflammatory creme help me? "Well, it probably won't, I'm just grasping at straws." What?! So, I can't have pain meds because I followed a doctor that works with you's orders, you won't try any conservative care like physical therapy, and you want to give me something you admit wont help me? "Well, we can try an injection to numb the pain nerve in your knee and see if that helps." That sounds promising, what will that do? How often will I need this shot to keep the pain away, how much does it hurt? "Well, if it works you would only need it the once. We would then go in and burn off the nerve ending so you couldn't feel the pain anymore." That sounds counterproductive. Follow me for a moment. Lets assume I am in real pain. "Yes, I believe you." So that leads us to believe there is something wrong, just it wasn't found on the MRI, right? "That is a possibility." And if we burn off the nerve, and I'm not in pain, I won't be going easy on my knee, thus making the problem worse. "Well, yes that is something that can happen." No. Other options. "Well, we could have you get a second opinion with a different orthopedic specialist in our facility." Thank you! Lets do that.
So now I have an appointment on September 14th, but I come here with two problems. The first being, I feel that this image of my left knee shows a tear in my outer ligament. The second being, if everyone is treating me like an addict and won't believe I'm in pain, how in the hell do I get workman's comp to believe me?
TL;DR Male 25 Left knee injury since July 27, 2017 5'11" 240lbs white Phoenix, AZ I am on (for my injury) oxycodone 5-325 1-2/6 hours, hydrocodone 5-325 1-2/12 hours, and ibuprofen 600mg 3/day For everyday use I am on duloxetine DR 60mg 1/day, hydroxyzine HCL 10mg 4/day, and quetiapine 25mg 1-2/day Left side MRI capture I am willing to send the full MRI to medical professionals, but I don't want to just post it for anyone on the web to get my information.
Submitted September 09, 2017 at 01:03PM by HalfwaytoIndecent http://ift.tt/2xVOw6R AskDocs
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