Waiting to see the doctor

I woke up one morning with pain extending from my left little finger and pinkie and crawling down the sides of my forearm to my elbow. Thinking about it, I blamed my big head for hurting my nerves, since I'm in the habit of putting my forearms under my head while I sleep.

When the pain did not subside, I forced myself to think about my activities over the past few days. Could I strike a nerve while spending an entire day at Mohegan Sun Casino? Or maybe while watching my favorite 007 James Bond movie, I could have crushed the nerve going around my elbow joint without realizing it. Other than that, nothing else I did was out of the ordinary that caused the nerve to be bruised. Although the pain was not debilitating, the mere presence of him, like a crawling spider, was annoying, as were the painful needles and tingling sensation.

Two weeks later, when the pain refused to go away, I began to treat it with the medical examination it deserved. First, it occurred to me that to make a proper diagnosis, I would have to stop acting like a patient and put my professional personality down. With my professional involved, I figured what hurts me could be part of the diagnostic basket containing shades of pinched nerves, from mild to severe. Are you sure? Not by any stretch of my imagination.

Then I began examining the origins of my self-diagnosis doubts. Is it because I know too much or too little? For example, a pins and needles sensation can be a sign of a vitamin deficiency, especially a B vitamin deficiency. My limited food preferences—mainly beans, fish, and peanuts—supported this suspicion. Broccoli used to be a part of my diet, but not anymore. However, in my professional opinion, vitamin deficiencies do not appear to be the root of my plight. After all, had it been a vitamin deficiency, the pain would have been felt in other parts of my body as well, not just my ring finger and pinky fingers.

Regardless of this knowledge, I decided to start taking vitamins B12 and B6. Not entirely surprising, however, that none of those vitamins relieved symptoms. A simple blood test, which I did not bother to order, would have revealed whether a vitamin deficiency was contributing to my disease. Why do I do what I don't do for my patients? This means that I would never have started any patient taking a vitamin supplement to treat such ailments without first getting a blood test to identify a deficiency. However, I was treating myself blindly, throwing all medical reasoning out the window.

Since I proved unable to be objective, I decided to seek help from a neurologist. I targeted a medical building office with a neurologist sign. Upon entering, two large women were in an open room behind a glass partition. They both looked up as I approached. The woman who was right behind the window attended me, while the other glanced around but continued to take care of the printer. No doubt she was eavesdropping on the conversation that followed. "how can I help you?" asked the receptionist. “I need to see a neurologist. I replied, ‘I have this sharp pain that goes from my fourth and fifth toe to my elbow, and I would like to see a neurologist.’” After shaking her head sideways a few times, she asked about my insurance, and I told her I had Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield. The receptionist asked for a 'card please' as she retrieves the appointment book and opens it. Of course, she brought the wrong card for which she was reprimanded, but she still tried to make an appointment to see the neurologist. The receptionist declared firmly, flipping the pages of the appointment book back and forth, " I don't have an appointment available until the end of November 2021," which is 45 days. "The doctor won't see you for 45 days, I confirmed.

Standing by the window, I thought, What will happen in 45 days? If I have a precarious condition that needs an urgent diagnosis, I would like to assure that there is no solution other than to request an appointment with the nearest family doctor. Even if it is a general specialty, it is really very useful, because the doctor has a vision, and he is always qualified to give the right advice at the right time...