So frustrated!

OH! I am getting so frustrated with this GI doctor's office!! It is impossible to talk to a live person. When his medical assistant called yesterday afternoon and told me there wasn't anything in the chart notes about doing a referral to a surgeon and she'd have to talk to the doctor, I asked how soon we'd be hearing back? She said she wouldn't be able to talk to the doctor about it until this morning. So, of course we hear nothing back this morning. At 10:50 I called and at least figured out how to navigate their menu to get to his assistant (voicemail of course)  and left her a message that I was following up on getting the surgeon appointment. 4 hours later now and still no return call.

I've tried getting through to her two more times and tried 2 other options on their menu to talk to a live person, even choosing "make an appointment" and still get a voicemail. This is ridiculous. While it wasn't emergency surgery he needed last Thursday after his endoscopy, I think a week is more than enough time to get this appointment taken care of! Especially after she found out yesterday that nothing was apparently in the works to get it done.

She's got one more hour to call me back or I'm going to try calling a surgeons office and see if I can set up an a consult appointment myself. I found a surgeons office in the same building as the endoscopy was done (part of the hospital and more than likely who he'd get referred to anyway by the GI) and it says they do gallbladder removal.

Dh is still feeling like crap and at this rate and just keep delaying, he's going to end up back in the hospital with another acute pancreatitis attack. I don't need another $35,000 in hospital bills!! I understand the GI doctor wanted to wait the month to do the endoscopy, to try to let his pancreas inflammation get gone as much as possible, as he said he would be able to see it better. But, now that he knows/thinks it's the gallbladder that is causing it and needs to come out, there is no reason for this stupid delay of getting an appointment for a consult with a surgeon.

UPDATE:

I called his primary care office here in town, first. She said his primary (the one he saw for follow up after getting out of hospital) is only in on Thursdays and Fridays, so won't be in until tomorrow. I explained what it going on and could I chat with her tomorrow about getting this referral done by her, since the GI's office has completely dropped the ball and I can't even get a hold of anyone there. I was still going to call this surgeon's office myself and talk to them and see if I could make an appt. Then his primary care office called me back and said they had just faxed over a referral to a surgeon. It turns out it was the same surgeons office I had found online and was going to call. Rather than wait for them to call me to set up the appointment (and wait who knows how many more days) I waited about a half hour and called them. She said she just got the fax, but hadn't entered anything in her system on it yet. She got right on it and at first she said the earliest available was 10/13, but then she said she can squeeze him in next Friday afternoon, on the 8th. I explained to her what is going on with the GI office and that I've been trying to find out from them for a week and she said "oh, they are the worst to try to get a hold of". I don't know how soon the surgery can get scheduled, but at least we are now moving forward with it all again. I have decided that if he does get another attack where he needs to go to the ER, I'm just then going to take him to the city hospital ER, where hopefully then they would just do emergency surgery to remove that gallbladder then.

I also ended up calling the primary care office back to see about getting him a refill on the omeprazole. When he was discharged from the hospital they gave him 30 days prescription. He ran out like last Sunday and coincidentally he has been feeling worse off since then, so maybe that was helping some. I have asked his GI office 2x now about the omeprazole and have not gotten an answer on that either. I'm sure no later than tomorrow his primary will take care of it and call the refill into the pharmacy. Seems like it might be a good thing for him to continue taking, at least until this gallbladder/pancreas issue is resolved.