Modern Medicine

I’m finally beginning to feel halfway human again after a nasty bout with the flu. Damn – I have never felt this lousy for so long. It started with a pesky cough and the chills and then quickly developed into full-blown creeping crud. My wife gave it to me. She recently had carpal tunnel surgery on both wrists and has been home most of the time. I can’t figure out who might have given it to her. She’s also got a flaming case of pansinusitis (all of her sinuses are infected).

This has not been a great winter health-wise at our house. I had to have a 15 mm kidney stone removed in December. This past Monday afternoon, I finally got an audience with His Eminence the urologist who electronically crushed my kidney boulder. I had to go sit in his waiting room and then in two different treatment rooms for the better part of an hour before he came in with the test results which would tell me what to avoid in my diet so I don’t get any more stones. I am prone to kidney stones and have probably passed around a half-dozen of them since I was in my mid-twenties. So, what does the highly trained specialist tell me? “You’re not at risk for kidney stones. I don’t know what’s causing them.”

You’d think he could have told me that over the phone! But noooooo! My insurance company and I had to pay for another office visit only to be told there doesn’t seem to be any reason for me to be getting kidney stones. Drink a little more water.

Geez – I hope my wife has better luck with the ear, nose and throat specialist (otorhinolaryngologist) she’ll be seeing. At the rate we’re going, it might be just as effective to call in a witch doctor to burn some herbs, shake a rattle and do a scary chant over us. What the hell, it was good enough for some of my old Cherokee ancestors.