{"id":7831,"date":"2016-06-20T06:33:08","date_gmt":"2016-06-20T11:33:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/?p=7831"},"modified":"2021-08-12T05:29:03","modified_gmt":"2021-08-12T10:29:03","slug":"dr-e-near-death-moment-experiences-healthcare-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/blog\/2016\/06\/20\/dr-e-near-death-moment-experiences-healthcare-system","title":{"rendered":"Dr. E Has A Near-Death Moment and Experiences The Healthcare System For Himself"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Since I\u2019ve written more than 1000 of these Health Tips over the years, you may not have noticed you\u2019ve been reading re-runs this past month. Although I try to keep us both away from doctors and hospitals as much as possible, sometimes you\u2019ve just got to bite the bullet, turn yourself over to someone else\u2019s expertise, and hope for the best.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Obviously, since I\u2019m writing this, my personal results were good. The fact that ten inches from my laptop is a flute of icy cold champagne is meant to convey a celebratory component, the celebration being I\u2019m not dead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I must say that when enough medical professionals tell you \u201cYou do realize you could have died\u201d there\u2019s a moment when your pain meds wear off, reasonable thought returns (considering the circumstances), and you realize everyone\u2019s quite serious. You\u2019re then left alone in your hospital room thinking, \u201cHoly shit, they\u2019re not kidding. I wasn\u2019t hallucinating about the grave looks.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And the next day you see the sun rising over Lake Michigan and you know you\u2019re alive. In fact, you\u2019re now talking to a \u201cdischarge planner\u201d (which sounds like something to do with your bowels, but is actually the person who will send you on your way). Later still, on the way home from the hospital, life takes on a new perspective. The trees along Lake Shore Drive are a richer green. At home, you hear nuances in your new CD of late Beethoven string quartets that you hadn\u2019t noticed before. And the juicy, dipped Al\u2019s Italian beef sandwich you scarfed down on the ride home\u2026ambrosial, your juice-stained T-shirt a new art form, perhaps a Jackson Pollack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A couple days later, you\u2019re outside on your deck on a warm summer afternoon, writing your Health Tips and sipping champagne.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So here\u2019s what happened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the Thursday before Memorial Day weekend, unaware of a wet spot on our kitchen floor, I fell and landed mightily on the very hip I\u2019d had replaced 11 years ago. Picture a cartoon character in pain, Road Runner or Roger Rabbit. You know how their eyes pop out in pain? Vroom, vroom. \u201cWow,\u201d I said from the floor, \u201cThat really hurt\u201d (what I actually said was far more colorful).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I figured I must have broken the hip and as much as I really didn\u2019t want to have another hip replacement or even go to the emergency room, off I went to Weiss Hospital<\/a>. Three reasons for Weiss:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. It\u2019s an efficiently run emergency department where you can be seen in minutes rather than hours.<\/li>
  2. It\u2019s managed by professional ER docs, not medical students.<\/li>
  3. I know the chief of joint replacement, Henry Finn, MD<\/a>, who has done good work with both my wife and many of my patients. Surgery to repair joints that already have implants is very complex and, handily, this is Dr. Finn\u2019s specialty.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    However, to everyone\u2019s surprise, the x ray of my hip was completely normal. The old implant was in perfect position and they said I just had a really bad bruise. I saw the x ray myself\u2014it looked just fine.  To say I was delighted is no exaggeration, but this delight, along with the Norco I\u2019d been prescribed, definitely interfered with my critical thinking skills. You learn in medical school to never, ever diagnose or treat yourself, and it\u2019s absolutely true. Your diagnostic skills, honed for decades, work only when they\u2019re directed toward others. Self diagnosis for a physician can kill you. It certainly almost killed me<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    A long holiday weekend<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

    So now I\u2019m home and it\u2019s Memorial Day weekend, leg elevated, unable to walk, waiting for my bruise to heal. WHC acupuncturist Mari Stecker<\/a> came by and though her pain relief treatment was as effective as a Norco, like the pain med it just didn\u2019t last. Our physical therapist Karen Meier also stopped by, encouraged some exercises, but added that if I wasn\u2019t better I should just get back to the hospital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Unfortunately, everything steadily worsened. By Memorial Day (Monday) I could barely walk a few feet, couldn’t go upstairs, and was peeing in a bottle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    On Tuesday, I called the emergency room and told them I was coming back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Dr. Finn met me at the ER entrance. Amazing as this sounds, with a bedside examination alone (no tests or x rays), in less than 60 seconds flat he diagnosed that:<\/p>\n\n\n\n