Houston GTG - November 16th, anyone?

[bebe]

Really don''t want to put a damper on our meeting at all, just voicing concern.

Still Le Peep at 10am?

 

[LaurenThePartier]

yes- that''s the plan still!

 

[appletini]

I''m a tentative now...I just found out that my BFF from college is coming in from Dallas and will be staying with me on Sat night so I''m not sure of her Sun departure plans so I might make it, but if I do I''ll be late to WF.

 

[LaurenThePartier]

Date: 11/15/2008 5:58:46 AM
Author: SanDiegoLady
I''ll be on layover in Houston in 2 hours.. I''ll wave from the airport! Twice this week & its beautiful.

We''ll be thinking of you, hon!

 

[bebe]

Wish you could join us!

 

[bebe]

Back from the GTG.

We had a great time. Thank you Lauren for pulling this together for us. She has the pictures, I''m sure she will post as soon as she can.
Anyway, it was a treat to see everyone and put faces with all the names and the rings!!

 

[LaurenThePartier]

Just arrived back in Dallas to find our cable Internet and phone down - yay FIOS!

I just wanted to thank everyone for coming out - weston and enjoyed meeting ya''ll - and I''ll post pics soon! Thank goodness for my iphone !!!

Beth and maria - sorry we didn''t make it for breakfast!

 

[curiopotter]

It''s okay Lauren, I had a blast! Thank you so much to Brian, Debi and Katie for having us! It was great to meet everyone finally!

I was feverishly checking the thread while I was at work hoping you''d have pictures up. Hope you get the cable up soon!

 

[iwannaprettyone]

bump!

 

[LaurenThePartier]

Date: 11/17/2008 3:19:16 PM
Author: iwannaprettyone
bump!

Kathryn, check my FB - I posted pics from the GTG there!

 

[iwannaprettyone]

k

 

[Lexie]

Ah.. I'm glad that y'all had fun!

Sorry that I didn't end up making it. Maybe next time..

Also.. thanks for the prayers, Lauren and curio

My Dad's face has been undergoing all sorts of changes within the past week, and although some of it is looking better, some of it is looking tons worse. Then he ended up falling again today, but didn't end up majorly injuring himself, thank goodness. We really just don't know what is going on, especially since the ER had not found anything truly abnormal or worrisome after all of their testing (EKG, CAT Scan, etcetera)

And then later we realized that we had forgotten to tell them that he had been in a minor car accident the previous week (my Dad and my Mom were stopped at a red light, and an elderly woman in the car behind them thought that the light had turned green and that the others cars were moving, and she rammed into them). He had apparently felt a bit disoriented and out of it afterwards, but he attributed it to mere shock, and hadn't told anyone. Maybe there's a correlation between the dizziness/subsequent falling and the accident?

The most frustrating thing is that we can't seem to be able to get him an appointment with his doctor. She knows about his ER visit because we called her office before heading over there, and she made the final decision on allowing him to go home that night. The ER people said that he should follow up with her 2-3 days afterwards, so we called to make an appointment last week, and they told us that the earliest that they could see him would be Monday, November 24th. Then my Mom remembered that she has jury that day, so she called them today to try to reschedule, and the next available appointment is on DECEMBER 1ST! Then my Mom told her what the ER had told us regarding the follow-up visit, and the woman at the doctor's office told her that it was standard procedure to see the doctor 2 weeks post-ER visit

My Mom also asked for a referral since his doctor is sooooo busy, and the woman said that if the ER people told us to go visit his doctor, then he has to. THEY'RE NOT MAKING IT EASY THOUGH!

The big problem is this: my Dad has atrial fibrillation; therefore, he is taking coumadin (a blood thinner) and has a pacemaker. The amount of bleeding that he had as a result of the falls was astronomical because of his blood not being able to clot, and the injuries he sustained were worse than they should have, and the healing process has been kind of wonky. We don't know if he should still be taking his medication or not. We called his cardiologist's office last week to ask them, and someone got back to us without an answer. They then said they would talk to the doctor, and we haven't gotten a call back yet. The lack of concern from his doctors is truly disheartening

Anyways, sorry for the vent and the long post

I guess that I'm now starting to understand emergency room overcrowding. So many people are unable to get appointments with their health care providers when they really need to see them, so they end up flocking over there so that they can be seen by someone.. anyone.

 

[curiopotter]

I'm sorry to hear about your Dad Lexie.

Part of the problem is that we have a huge shortage of private practice primary care physicians right now. That's why it's difficult to get appointments. Apparently less than 2% of medical school students want to go into family practice or primary care. There was a survey put out recently and 49% of primary care doctors surveyed said they would quit if they COULD. Which is really scary to think about. They also have a difficult time keeping up with the business side of their practice so many of them want to quit. They're so swamped with mounds of paperwork and little help from insurance companies.

Keep calling the physicians office, and if they don't get back to you, tell them it's an emergency.

ETA: Tell your mom she can call the courthouse and reschedule her jury duty in order to take your dad to the doctor sooner.

 

[Lexie]

Mhm.. I believe I had read something along those lines somewhere. It is very disconcerting indeed. I guess that other specialties are more appealing to medical students than primary care because of better compensation and job satisfaction.

At any rate, the aforementioned doctor is an internist (Doctor of Internal Medicine) in the Texas Medical Center. I'm not entirely sure if that would fall under primary care or not

Things are now up in the air, however. We just got a call from her office saying that they reached his cardiologist's office, and it seems that he had been out last week because of a kidney stone, which explains why we weren't called back in a timely manner. Unfortunately though, it means that he's currently backlogged

The nurse is going to try to talk to them later to see if my Dad needs to see him. If so, then we would cancel his Monday appointment with the internist and he would go see the cardiologist instead. Who knows when his next available appointment is though. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens..

As far as my Mom's jury duty is concerned, she has already rescheduled it twice, so she can't change the date anymore.

I'm sure that things will work themselves out somehow. I just hate seeing him all hurt and broken