$15,000 for less than nothing

I looked at the insurance bills for my mom's ER visit a few weeks ago.

Y'know the ER visit where she went in because of vision loss in her left eye, and the doc wrote in the report she came in for a migraine, and "after treatment the patient said she was improved so we discharged her" but actually a mild pain in her head was the least of her worries and she STILL clearly said she was partially blind in her left eye but he said it was nothing and to "follow-up with your ophthalmologist WHEN YOU CAN" and not urgently?!

Yeah that time.

They billed the insurance company $15,000 for that visit.

$15,000 to lie to us, create a false report to look like they did their job instead of missing a branch retinal vein occlusion (when there's a blockage or shrinking of a vein IN YOUR EYE that causes partial blindness and if treated promptly can be completely reversed about 60%-70% of the time and 20%-30% of the time can be greatly improved and the other 5-10% won't ever improve)

The doctor is a locum tenens doc which means he isn't technically an employee and as if it wasn't hard enough to sue or complain about doctors in hospitals, it's fucking impossible with locum tenens.

So this asshole gets to work wherever he wants (and when I looked him up he's been EVERYWHERE like seriously how many people have you fucked up when you've worked in more states than you haven't?) and the hospitals get to let these fucks bring in thousands of dollars for a few minutes of "durr nuttin wrong here folks go home"

$15,000 and my mom very perfectly described the symptoms of a BRVO to him.

Oh and since Covid started, BRVOs and CRVOs are happening A LOT more than they used to.

Seriously folks if you get dark "floaters" in your eye(s) suddenly, go to a retinal urgent care NOW. If it's nothing then yay. If it's BRVO or CRVO then you may have just saved your eyesight.

Even though this condition used to be rare, they STILL usually test for it in ERs because it's so serious, and if it happens to be a CENTRAL retinal vein occlusion instead of BRANCH retinal vein occlusion and it's not promptly treated, you lose your eyesight within 5 years.

This is also a doctor who let a Covid positive patient walk around maskless even after diagnosing her. She was wandering around talking to people in the emergency room because she was bored.

Other than the admitting nurse, my mom and I were the only ones with masks on.

It's like... why bother going to the emergency room unless you're dying and ya just gotta hope they pay attention to what they're doing?!

The retinal specialist I took my mom to over a week later after we finally found out what happened was super nice, and he works in an office that has a doc on call 24/7 for emergencies.

They treat eye emergencies within 4 hours of arrival no matter how busy they are.

I told everyone in my family that the next time they have ANY eye issues, don't go to the ER. Go to this retinal specialist urgent care office.

Within 4 hours he diagnosed her with EXACTLY what was wrong, set up a baseline, and began eye injection treatments.

So back when this all happened, I could've taken her there and within 4 hours she could've been treated for something that leaves some people completely blind.

more about the brvo

Oh and I'd also like to mention that prior to this year I'd never actually known someone who had this even though I worked in the medical field for YEARS and docs would check for it every time someone came in with an eye issue.

Now I know two people -- my mom and a tattoo artist friend who owns several tattoo shops.

He had this happen about seven months ago, but he thought it would go away on its own. A month later he finally went to the eye doc and was diagnosed and they started injections.

He has it in both eyes (likely because he's diabetic). His parents are both in wheelchairs, and he's their 24/7 caretaker. He also owns 3 tattoo shops and is an artist himself, so he's a pretty busy guy.

Since this happened, he's only been able to do "bangers" -- small tattoos with only a few colors each. He's hopeful he'll recover fully, but he's been through the full treatment of monthly eye injections (6 is the limit for improvement) and they've started on laser treatments that don't always help.

I haven't heard anything about this on the news or social media, and yet it's becoming so common that the ophthalmologist who diagnosed my mom sighed when he looked at the scan of her eye, walked out into the hallway, called one of his nurses over, and whispered "we got another occlusion, can you get the emergency referral to the retinal specialist going please?"

And when we were at the retinal specialist, there were four other people in the waiting room who were there for the injections (I heard them at the front desk).

And even while my mom got the injections, there was someone in the next room getting them.

So that's five people in the specialist's office just that day within 4 hours that I know of. The place was kinda busy so there may have been more.

Also this can happen in an area of your eye where you can't see it, and you'd never know you had it without a retinal scan.

Those cases aren't nearly as bad because it doesn't threaten your vision, but it's still happening and if you're going in for eye surgery and find it on a scan, they have to postpone or cancel your surgery until they're sure they won't cause another occlusion during surgery.

But yes this is all completely normal 🙄and Covid is nothing more than a cold or flu so I don't know why all these people are getting so worked up about it and forcing me to wear a *gasp* dIaPeR oN mY fAcE! Sheeeeeple!!

Sorry to rant a bit at the end there but my own extended family thinks we're insane for wearing masks and being careful about Covid, colds, flu, and other illnesses even though we have shitty immune systems and there's tons of strokes in my mom's side of the family.

Like I get it if you don't agree. I'm not forcing you to wear a mask. But leave me the fuck alone and stop harassing me and constantly acting like it's an attack on YOU because I want to wear one.

I haven't been sick in over three years and it's GLORIOUS I DIDN'T KNOW LIFE COULD BE LIKE THIS!