In the Market for a New Podiatrist

So last week Tuesday, I go to the podiatrist at the hospital in my little town. I'm all jazzed because I'm anxious to get this damn painful ingrown toenail removed and start treating the knife sticking out of my heel....I mean my plantar facitis. So the doctor removes my ingrown toenail, applies some solution that kills the part of the root where the ingrown toenail was growing out of (so it won't recur), has x-rays done of my foot, and diagnoses me with plantar facitis. Groovy. He tells me to make another appointment to start treatment for the plantar facitis. So I make an appointment for last week Friday. He seemed competent on Tuesday, but it all went downhill on Friday.

It all started on Friday when he walked in and introduced himself like we had never met before. Um, I was just here 3 days ago. I realize you may have forgotten me, but you're holding my chart in your hands. You could have read it over and pretended like you remembered me. I was in slight shock and said something like I was just here a few days ago for my plantar facitis and ingrown toenail. So he removes the bandaid from my ingrown tneoail, looks at it and says, yep we'll take care of that. HE STARTS TO TAKE OUT THE STUFF TO NUMB MY TOE AND REMOVE THE TOENAIL!!!! So slightly panicked, I exclaim "you just did this on Tuesday!!!" or something intelligent like that. So he apologizes and finally starts to look at my chart and realizes that yes indeedy he did remove my ingrown toenail 3 days ago. Oh and he reeks of cigarette smoke like he just chain smoked a pack in the last 20 minutes. So without washing his hands or putting on gloves, he gets out this metal pokey thingie that may or may not be sterile and starts poking my toe. He puts some gunk on it, bandages it back up and writes me a scrip for antibiotics. I'm wondering why he didn't prescribe antibiotics on Tuesday, but seeing how fast this appointment is going downhill, it really didn't surprise me.

Onto my heel. He starts to write me a prescription for something tor reduce the inflammation. I ask if this will interfere with pregnancy because Mike and I are ttc and I may be pregnant and just not know it. He says "no I don't think so" but then crumples up the paper and throws it away. He seems rather disgusted by this tidbit and again I'm wondering why he went through the trouble of writing the prescription. I told him I'm taking Clomid-I'm not taking it just to see if I really will get hot flashes and sore boobies. So apparently I'm not getting any medication to reduce the inflammation because he doesn't say anything else. He tells me that Marge, his wingman (wingwoman?) is going to see if orthotic shoe inserts are covered by my insurance. He leaves, and a few minutes later he and Marge walk in. Marge is carrying a bowl of water and these long paper mache looking strips. I'm wondering if we are going to start doing arts and crafts. He puts the chair all the way back and tells me to roll over on my stomach. WTF?!?!?!? So I do, and they start paper macheing my feet-making the molds for my handy dandy shoe inserts. It felt weird. So while this is going on, I'm asking all kinds of questions about how often to wear the inserts, icing my foot, should I wear shoes all day, how often should I get new shoes, etc. I was really looking for a specific treatment plan and got nothing. He basically blew off my questions and seemed like these inserts will magically cure me. No information on if I'll ever need new ones, do these wear out, etc. It was so weird. So I go out by Marge who tells me the inserts will be ready in 2-3 weeks. So I ask if my insurance covers these and she says that Oconto County employee insurance has covered them before so there shouldn't be a problem. She didn't even call my insurance!!!! Oh, but to reassure me she says, if insurance doesn't cover these, the hospital will "work with you on payments." Oh gee thanks, that's comforting. Then Marge gets in a dig about how government employees insurance is usually much better than those working in the private sector. Again, gee thanks. The 3 people in the waiting room glared at me for having good insurance. What they don't know is that I pay out the ass for it because I'm part time.

Good times. So yes, obviously I'm looking for a new podiatrist. This one scared the heebie jeebies out of me.

In other news, I have a nephew!!!! Dylan Thomas Barnhart was born on December 5th at 1:42 am. He is perfect and we love him dearly. Will post more later about that. I really should get to work. Plus Dylan deserves his own post!