Yesterday, I had an appointment with a new hand specialist in Denver for my carpal tunnel.

My adjuster was able to find someone close that I could go to for a follow up for my wrist and elbow. I made the appointment for 1:15pm yesterday, showed up about 1:12, filled out my paperwork then sat there for a good 30 minutes before I was shown into an exam room.

The nurse came in about five minutes later to talk to me, ask questions and tell me what the next steps were and that the doctor would be in soon…yeah right. It was another 10 minutes before he came in, seemed pleasant, told me I looked familiar, spent about 7 minutes talking to me, tapping on my wrist, asked me a few questions and then walked out, really? The nurse came back, told me what the next steps were and then I was done.

I was at the office for an hour and spent less than 20 minutes talking to anyone medically trained.
What happened to bedside manners? There was a time that doctors would spend time with you, make you feel special, like s/he cared. Don’t they make movies where the “country” doctor still makes house calls, knows all their patients by name, is someone the community knows and gathers around? Isn’t that called bedside manner? Seems like a lost art.
The nurse and receptionist were very nice, the doctor was nice enough, but seemed like he had somewhere else to be, didn’t leave me with warm fuzzies, oh well…

So…the next step in my carpal and cubital tunnel treatment is nerve testing. The nurse is reaching out to the workers comp insurance company to get approval and then I will get a call from a testing place and we go from there. I’ll keep you posted.