Drug Testing

A few weeks ago I went to my "pain doctor", yep, there is actually a specialty in pain medicine. It seems kind of funny because I would think most doctors see patients with pain, right? I think that pain specialists must just have more patience for whining. At least my guy does. We will call him Dr. C. I love Dr. C, he has putting up with me for over ten years, longer than some marriages last. Doctors who treat people with chronic illnesses have to form some kind of relationship with their patients since they are often with them for years and years. Slice and dice surgeon-types probably would not have the tenacity to deal with the chronically ill, they mostly seem to want to cut out whatever shouldn't be in their patients' body and pawn off the whining sicky to the next guy. I don't blame them. If I get sick of myself complaining I wonder how my doctors feel? It must get old.
Anyway, Dr C is cool. The only thing is that he is a Republican. Every time I go in (as the Obama health plan gets closer to being a done deal, or is it? I am not that sure) to see C he broods more and more gloom and doom about the "future of health care"..Now I am no genius but I can definitely tell that the deal with my health care sucks. And I have it pretty good. I don't know how to fix it, but I think one thing might help, get all the greedy sons of bitches out of it. Health care for profit is a disgusting idea. Hospitals can't be run like Walmart or factories. Dr. C is a compassionate guy which makes it strange that he has chosen that political leaning.
But anyway, I did not really start writing to talk about "the state of health care" . No what I wanted to talk about was drug testing.
I went to C's office and ,for the first time, his nurse asked me to pee in a cup. This is standard for a lot of my docs to ask of me but I never had to do this at his office. So, being the curious gal I am I asked, "why the pee cup?" His nurse told me that they have started testing the patients because they want to make sure we are taking are meds. Some of the patients, apparently, have been selling their drugs. I thought this was hilarious! Not the drug selling, but the fact that I was being drug tested to make sure I am taking drugs! Oh irony of ironies!
At the chronic pain doctor office the staff has kind of a reserved disdain for the patients. Not the docs, just everyone else. That treat all the patients as addicts (I am not saying that some aren't but we are not all there to score) I think this is why this particular office has the worst magazines. The last time I was there the only thing to read was Popular Mechanics. I don't know anyone who reads that, in the world, really. The office staff thinks we will steal the mags. I don't think the patients at C's office are any more likely to steal magazines than someone at an obstetrician's office. Its a bad rap we get, being viewed as whining wussy addicts. It was definitely worth it going just to get the pee test, though. Life just keeps getting funnier!