[caption id="attachment_105948" align="alignnone" width="225"]
By William Tauro
Either I am super human or the doctor/surgeon misdiagnosed my injury and/or lied to me?
Dec 31st (New Year’s Eve Day):
Fell 12’ feet off a ladder while fiddling around on my boat and landed on my right heel.
Jan 1st 10:00am (New Year’s Day):
Went to Mount Auburn Hospital Emergency Room where they told me I had a completely torn off Achilles tendon and a fractured ankle where they put me into a cast up to my knee informing me that I need surgery.
Jan 2nd 2:00pm:
Went back to the Mount Auburn Hospital to their orthopedic surgeon where they put me in another 2nd cast up to my knee and gave me two options.
Option#1: If I elect to not have surgery, they said eight weeks in a full cast with four additional weeks in a boot with no driving at all to let my injury heal on it’s own.
Option #2: The surgeon’s practitioner came out and told me that the doctor informed him that luckily he has an opening and that he could squeeze me in to perform surgery immediately and that he could have me walking around normal and out of a cast/boot in only four weeks and castfree. So before I left, they put me back into another full leg cast again up to my knee with instructions not to drive. I asked the practitioner “How much time do I have to make a decision?” He replied “You have at least three weeks to make a decision.”
Meanwhile, as I was exiting the surgeon’s office on crutches, a practitioner in the office, looked me directly in the eye, and said “You need a second opinion.” and I took that as a serious warning he was trying somehow to give me for some reason heads up, so I took that persons advice.
Jan 2nd (same day)3:00pm (only one hour after me leaving the surgeon’s office after them putting me back into a knee high cast again):
I went to see a highly recommended, by a very good friend of mine, a Chinese ankle specialist in Boston‘s Chinatown who was booked up and could not handle me at that particular moment, and since I was referred to him from a trusted mutual family friend ours he instead went a step further and referred me over to his father, a 74 year-old retired ankle doctor for immediate vip treatment. For legal reasons I will refer to him as what he was jokingly around with me introduced himself as the “Chinese Witch Doctor.”
The Chinese Witch Doctor looked at the x-ray that I showed him and stated that “your ankle is not fractured and your Achilles Tendon is not torn off so let’s take that cast off and throw it in the friggin barrel.” After removing the cast, he used his thumbs to find multiple pressure points on my leg that showed lack of blood flowing so he began working on my foot vigorously, pounding on the heel, pounding on the tendon, stretching my foot back-and-forth. He stated “if your Achilles Tendon was completely torn and your knee was fractured that you’d be kicking me in the head right now with tremendous pain and you wouldn’t be able to move your foot at all.”
After about an hour of massaging my leg, putting herbal ingredients on my foot and stretching my ankle and muscles, he went back to putting his finger on pressure points on my leg and ankle that showed me where blood was flowing once again and I had no more pain.
Friday Jan 5th 1:00pm:
I went back to see the Chinese Witch Doctor (only three days after my first initial visit with him) he performed physical therapy on my ankle. Worked my knee over a little bit and says you’re good to go. No surgery needed. Have a great life!
Monday Jan 8th3:30pm:
I went for a third opinion with new x-rays just to satisfy my mind at the Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital in Boston and yes, they confirmed with me and the Chinese Witch Doctor’s diagnosis. They agreed that there is no fracture of the knee and that the achilles tendon “IS NOT COMPLETELY TORN OFF”, THAT I DON’T NEED ANY SURGERY NOR A KNEE HIGH CAST” and They repeated that “I DEFINITELY DON’T NEED ANY SURGERY” as the Mount Auburn crew suggested differently and that I was good to go. They did suggest if I’m going to be out walking around campaigning everywhere on it like I am, that for a week or so walk around with a half boot and take it off when the swelling goes down just as a preventative precaution while on the mend to promote healing.
I never went back to the Mount Auburn Hospital because I waited to get another x-ray just to make certain before I wrote this article and I knew that I would’ve gave them a piece of my mind in my own way, and it wouldn’t be nice and it wouldn’t of ended good, so here this was the way the story goes and how and what transpired.
This is a perfect example on how a doctor can easily misdiagnose or misrepresent an injury and how it can impact and do damage on somebody’s career or lifestyle.
By placing a full cast or a boot on someone’s leg, especially a driving leg for 9 to 12 weeks could be devastating to a family who depends on someone who needs to work or if a person drives for a living to support them. Not to mention a chain reaction of effects that could severely impact someone’s career.
A very good doctor friend of mine who has recently passed away, sat down with me last year one afternoon for lunch, and we had a conversation about other doctors. Other doctors would sometimes ask him “How come you recommend so many gastric bypass surgeries to so many patients?” And they would continue stating to him “Because you are taking food off our table where we are surgeons and we make money, amputating, legs and toes. “This is true, because doctors are a business as well.
Another similar circumstance happened about 14 years ago as I was referred by my Mount Auburn Hospital doctor into going into the Lawrence Memorial Hospital in Medford to receive a gastric bypass. As I entered this operating room under sedation/anesthesia. The surgeon looked me directly into my eyes and said “Bill when I go in and if I see your gallbladder doesn’t look good I will remove it ok?” And like I said, being sedated under anesthesia while being wheeled into the operating room, I looked at him blurry eyed and repeated “ok?” When surgery ended after an hour or so and as I was waking up in the recovery room, the first face that I saw was the surgeon. He looked down at me and said “Bill just to let you know I didn’t like how your gallbladder looked so I removed it!” While still under anesthesia all that I could say at the moment was “ok” as awaiting the anesthesia to wear off.
Some time later come to find out that there was nothing wrong with my gallbladder. This particular surgeon did it to make money. This particular surgeon was also doing this to multiple other patients having surgery during this time period as well. He finally got caught, lost his license to practice and moved on into hiding. A year or two after that this butcher of a doctor became the head of barometric surgery in another local hospital that I don’t want to mention that’s located next-door to Somerville. After all this occurred, the statute of limitations had already expired, and I couldn’t do a thing about it. But now, living without a gallbladder, I have to take certain medications for the rest of my life to make up the bile that the gallbladder is now no longer producing. Like I said, doctors are a business so proceed with caution.
The moral of the story is, don’t always put your trust into just one doctor. Always get a second opinion and even a third. Remember that doctors, even doctors who have fancy doctor’s offices in hospitals always still have rent to pay and that it’s still a business. It’s disappointing, but true!
#ISupportMyLocalWitchDoctor
[caption id="attachment_105950" align="alignnone" width="116"]
Processed with MOLDIV
