I could just SCREAM.

I am beyond frustrated with unnamed Aurora medical center’s audiology department.
We got referred there by our insurance when Kendall first failed her followup hearing test through early intervention. They are the only place within 25 miles that insurance has approved for this test. It will cost us roughly $2500 if we go somewhere out of network for it. So we’re kind of locked in.
The doctor who is supposedly the only one in the hospital who can do this test calls me herself to set this test up. She tells me she has to leave town for a few weeks due to a family situation, but schedules me for the day after she is due to return, which was last Thursday. So I rearrange our schedule and trek on out to BFE for this test.
We get there and this med student who looks like she maybe is old enough to remember the turn of the millenium takes us back and proceeds to just start hooking kendall up to stuff. NO confirmation that she has the right kid, no birthdate confirmation, no family history, nothing. She just starts hooking her up. Kendall complies by promptly failing that test, but she continues to attempt to get better results for about ten minutes before huffing and puffing that we just need to go do the booth test. I explain that we have already DONE the booth test, I have her results, we got referred here for ABR testing blah blah blah, and doogie hauser has NO interest in even seeing what we’ve had done.
We go into the booth (oh after waiting for twenty minutes because someone else was in there getting tested), where she proceeds to engage with kendall the WHOLE TIME, so of course kendall is making the appropriate social cues to noises. After having been through this booth testing more times than i can count between karissa and kaylen and kendall’s first failed attempt, i can wholeheartedly confirm that this was NOT an appropriate way to conduct this test.
Doogie lets us out of the booth and proclaims kendall’s hearing perfect and do we need a copy of anything and have a nice life.
I CALMLY explained to her that we weren’t here for a repeat VRA/OAE, but that we were here to get an ABR by Dr. H. Doogie sputters that Dr. H isn’t there, she’s on a family emergency, and the papers didn’t say ABR. We go up to the front desk to confirm this, and doogie realizes her mistake. She then tells me that she can do the ABR no problem and starts once again hooking kendall up to things. By this time (an hour later) kendall is just DONE being poked and prodded and hooked up to machines. Nonetheless, doogie pushes onward, convinced that she will get results within minutes to prove her theory that kendall can hear perfectly. After ANOTHER HOUR of her trying to get kendall’s brain wave responses under control in spite of an obviously very tired baby who was not remaining very calm and quiet as we were instructed, she storms out of the room and comes back in with a more senior doctor, one who i am assuming has actually graduated from both high school AND medical college. This doctor proceeds to take a history, put the clinical picture together with everything, and asks why we are not doing this test sedated. I told her that was a very good question and i would like to know why i wasn’t notified that Dr. H wasn’t going to be in the office in the first place. They have no answer for this but leave the room to huddle.
Doogie comes back in and starts unhooking kendall and tells me that Dr. H will be back on monday and she will have her call us to review the results, but that since kendall DID pass the booth test with flying colors that Dr. H probably will agree that she needs no further followup or testing.
I was LIV. ID. For those who have the privilege of having SEEN my temper in real life, you know that while it takes a while to get there, when it goes it goes. I was so angry i was shaking as we left the parking lot. FOUR HOURS of time wasted there, insurance coverage down the drain because barring some amazing business office magic skills, they are not going to pay for a repeat test so close to the first one, if they even pay for one at all, all my anxious worries and stresses over waiting to find out if kendall has permanent hearing loss – all of that just brushed off lightly like this chick was determining what shade of makeup kendall should wear instead of whether or not she has a disability.
I called the office back the next morning to leave a voicemail for Dr. H, and Doogie instead picks up the phone in Dr. H’s office. She proceeds to be snippy with me that she is going to pass the message on to Dr. H and that i’ll receive a call when Dr. H has had a chance to review the file, probably on Monday morning.
So THIS MORNING I receive yet ANOTHER call from Doogie stating that Dr. H was taken to the ER with possible pneumonia and they don’t know when she will return.
I am beyond angry – what comes past angry – shock? tears? pulmonary hypertension?
All of the above.
I just want ONE SImPLE answer for this kid! Why can’t we get any answers?????
I know God has a lesson somewhere in all of this frustration and futility. I don’t see it right now, but I am sure someday i will.
I just had to get this out because venting it somewhere feels better than just letting it boil up inside.
This doesn’t make me feel all warm and fuzzy about going BACK to this place, but i feel stuck. There’s no where else we CAN go without having to auction off one of the other children to pay for it!
I just hate feeling stuck is all. Stuck with no answers. Stuck and frustrated beyond belief that this chick will possibly have screwed up our chances to figure out what’s going on with kendall’s hearing and its possible clues to her bigger issues all because she wanted to dress up and play doctor and not admit when she was in WAY over her head. This all could have been taken care of in the first five minutes of the appointment if she’d taken a stupid medical history or done her JOB and confirmed why we were there.
it’s all just so insanely stupid and i have tried and tried to be not angry about this all weekend, hoping it would get resolved this morning and now i find out it could be ANOTHER long week, and even then it won’t be resolved.
I just want to scream at someone or something and i want an answer and i want it to be fixed now and i want kendall to be fixed now and i am tired of being on this ride and i want off already.

read quick i am deleting this one for sure later.

t