Adventures In Neurology
I went to see my new neurologist today.
Personally, I hadn’t been interested in acquiring a new neurologist since moving to Maine. It seemed to me that they were pretty useless as the two I saw in New Orleans never really figured anything out and didn’t seem to run any tests and one of them dropped me because he said there was nothing else he could do for me.
Anyway, the new GP wanted me to go because my migraines and headaches are getting more frequent and painful again, but my blood pressure is staying gloriously normal.
So, I went.
And when I got there, there was a problem with my insurance…sort of…basically my insurance will only pay for visits to doctors that my GP has refered me to and that requires paperwork and after two months, the GPs office hadn’t sent it yet. After a conversation with the GP’s desk clerk, it turns out that whoever entered the order and scheduled me, did so without entering the referral information. Hopefully that gets worked out because it’s going to really make me sick to get a real bill from the neurologist I didn’t want to see in the first place. Heh.
However, I do like the new neurologist. First of all, she’s a woman. I have found that many male doctors are quite dismissive and seem to think that most of women’s ailments are in their heads; I guess it’s because they’ve never had the experience of PMS or a PMS-triggered migraine. I found her to be very understanding. I also liked that she’d already looked over my records from my previous neurologists and knew what had already been tried. I liked that she seemed to be open to my thoughts — for example, I think I have a sensitivity to light that causes my face to flush when I have a migraine or have one coming on. I’ve never read of anyone else having that issue but she at least said that it was quite possible because I’m so fair and fair people have extra sensitivity of things.
Anyway, so she doesn’t think I should bother trying any more preventative treatments because basically I’ve tried all the ones out there. She gave me some samples of migraine pain meds to try and if I find one that works well for me, she’ll call in a prescription — wow, I don’t have to waste tons of money on meds that don’t work! Since the other preventatives don’t work, I am now a candidate for botox. The paperwork has been started to convince my insurance it’s for medical reasons, not shallow ones. Kinda scary though.
She also told me to stop taking Tylenol completely. It’s obvious it does nothing for me. Other drugs to give up are ultracet and vicadin as they are pretty useless, though they may have helped at one time.
I thought it was interesting that she thinks IBS and migraines are linked. She said that people with too high serotonin levels have constipation and people with too low serotonin levels have diahrrea. I know that a lot of people think migraines are due to a serotonin inbalance in the brain. Interesting theory.
Oh, and of course she told me to either start exercising or start reducing my caffeine intake (take a few months to get it down to 16oz a day). I’m pretty sure she eventually wants me to do both. Oy.
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