Bureaucracy raises its ugly head

Joint replacement surgery is in high demand everywhere right now, its a baby-boomer demographic issue. The Big Beluga is on the tailing edge of the baby-boomer demographic, not a good place to be.

Anyhow, I had anticipated that a referral from the Musco-skeletal specialist would sort of position me in a higher priority group with the surgeon. Not so. It still took me about three months just to see the surgeon. I had also hoped that perhaps he could due a variation of a hip replacement called a "Birmingham", which resurfaces rather than replaces the ball part of the femur in the ball and socket joint of the hip. Advantage: may be stronger for younger people and allows for an additional revision of the hip joint at later times.

Alas, my hips were not good candidates for this procedure. Note I said "hips". The first thing that the surgeon said to me was "your hips suck." That is, we were talking about getting both hips done rather than the one that was giving me the most trouble. Then the next shocker: the waiting time for surgery was 10-11 months! The surgeon was sympathetic to my plight, he said that it was now possible to do both hips at one time, although not preferred, and that if my hips were really killing me in 10 or 11 months then perhaps we could do that. He also gave me the names of several other surgeons whom he thought would do a wonderful job.

So I had myself put on a "standby" list and went away to contemplate my karma. To me, 10-11 months was just too long, I would be completely crippled by then. So I tried some of the other Surgeons that were suggested. Their waiting times for surgery were 6-9 months but I would have to make an appointment for an assessment and that would be 3-4 months, so I was no better off. It appears that the mistake I made was not going directly to a surgeon a year ago when I had elected to see a Musco-skeletal specialist. This was, in effect, punishing me for trying to maximize my time on my own joints.

Then it dawned on me that I had already seen a surgeon years ago, the one that told me that my hockey playing days were over. If he had still been in practice I would have been seen much sooner. I went to my family Doctor and complained and she wrote a letter to the 10-11 month surgeon. I also asked a family member, who is a Nurse that works with Surgeons that do joint replacement, if she could help. She asked a Surgeon to see me and he very kindly did, on very short notice. However, he could not accelerate the surgery list so I was still 6 months away from surgery. At least I had some hope but the process leading up to getting the surgery was quite frustrating.