I am a Bitchy Cripple and I intend to do something about it.
First, I will share a Facebook post with my peep posse who followed the progress of my back surgery, which in all was a three year process:
Facebook post, November 16, 2017 (six months and eight days post-op.)
Off to see the surgeon. Six-month follow-up. #UVA Spinal Center. Tomorrow, bone scan. Whopper!
UPDATE: Mr. Spine is OK — -. Woop! Bone Scan for left knee — mrs knee (making sure hardware not damaged). One down, one to go. 🌞
It is Two Years Later:
The Spinal fusion revision that was urgently recommended was a colossal FAILURE. I did not have that permanently planned as a part of my life.
It turned out in the final analysis that surgeons Hamid Hassenzedeh and Bobby Chodoury did several criminal things to me:
1) HH did a more extensive operation than he proposed to my husband and I, with two rods and twenty screws encompassing the entire back. I can no longer put on any shoes but slip-ons.
2) The surgery ultimately caused nerve damage and affecting use of the left leg
3) I was not allowed to stay in the ICU for more than two days and was sent to an aftercare rehab without proper notification that I was an intensive care post op having high risk revision surgery on my back. The rehab, #Encompass, of insisted on giving me rehab as a regular patient because the surgeon never had notes sent.
4) When the Rehab discovered I had high risk spinal surgery they sent me home within six days.
5) I ended up injured long-term and with #MRSA and later was diagnosed with full-blown #Lymphedema which was a result of this #surgery.
6) Finally, a hospital resident under Hamid #Hassenzadeh refused to read the doctors notes which said “Patient cannot have #Oxicotin or Dilaudin”
He gave me Oxicotin anyway. This is a teaching hospital. This is also a doctor who should be disbarred before he kills someone.
They all should.
I am now in a wheelchair, probably permanently.
High risk did not have to be at my expense.
This hospital should not be the number one hospital in my state. I am aware that many, many others agree. The former CEO Pamela is now working at New York Presbyterian. She refused to speak with me. I was told by a patient relations manager, Vickie Marsh, that my problems were emotional in scope and it was not her job to have a conversation with a patient.
Pardon me, but is it not their job to see that we get well in a hospital?
And Dr Bobby Chodoury, the Director of Orrhopedics, is on the hospital board. Do you think he would give me the time of day? No.
Shame on all of them.
And they are all at The University of Virginia. Yes. #UVA
My #failed #surgery and aftercare cost One Million Dollars. Fortunately we had insurance. But what if we had not?
As for the nerve damage, Neurologist Dr Ted Burns found it, and if I did not go through another doctor in Rheumotology, I would have never known.
And Head of Endrocrynology, Dr Jennifer Kirby taught me a great deal about our fat genes…and detected my Lymphedema…Thank you, Dr Kirby. I remain a fan.
I am angry, but in a strange way I am grateful. Dr Burns, Dr Kirby and Dr Lori have kept me from rising out of my wheelchair and punching out Dr H, Dr Bobby, Kurt Graham at Encompass and that Jackass resident from the ICU! But I want to. And The head of #UVA, Jim West, and your PR drones, give me a break. Your puff pieces and success stories have had some balance recently. Here is just a half a pint more…
I’m alive after multiple surgeries.
I’m loved. I’m cared for. My husband has turned into my caregiver! Even though I’m Bitchy, crass, corpulent, I sing. I sound like a thrush. If a nursing home should need me, wheel me there. The patients are my people. I am a certified hospice and Alzheimers Music Therapy volunteer. I can help. Life goes on.
(I AM NOT GIVING UP! Not quite yet. Look out.)
Sincerely,
Your Bitchy Cripple.
(Oh, my blog is The Bitchy Cripple on Facebook.
If Kaiser Permanente -Washington Post can expose this incompetence, well then! So can I.)
