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Apr 14, 2018 12:06PM
- edited
Apr 14, 2018 03:59PM
by
chronicpain
I am not sure if this post belongs on the "angry rants" forum but it has to do with Biozorb so I will post here.
Saw my BS yesterday. She was running late because the pt before me who was new had come late and there was another new one after me, so maybe that is why she was unexpectedly abrupt and snippy and her desire to quickly get rid of me was obvious. She clearly was not very interested in hearing about the pain I have around the Biozorb and SNB site, and was annoyed by my questions. She said my Biozorb area pain is just normal post-op pain, then firmly mashed around in the relevant areas without asking if there was pain or watching my face, (there was a lot) and pronounced there was nothing of concern.
I noted the Biozorb has not gotten any smaller at almost five months now, and it was not sore after the immediate postop period, but she just repeated the manufacturer's info that it takes a year to resorb and also reminded me that "postop pain" lasts a year.
I asked if it would start to resorb quickly later on in the year, exponentially, as we are five months now and it is the same, or be a slow linear process that will start at some point in the near future, and she just repeated her "it resorbs within one year" mantra. I asked if she has ever had to take it out surgically due to failure to resorb, inflammation or other symptoms, and she said no, but paused and said they have only been using it two to three years or so. I was going to ask how many Biozorbs she had done, but thought better of it.
I asked if it would interfere with my mammogram coming up which (per our last discussion) is due late May, i.e., at six months post surgery. After first initially arguing that late May is not six months post surgery (surgery was 11/22/17) she caught herself and said I would not need a mammogram until a year after my pre-diagnosis mammogram, so in September ( so post lumpectomy mammogram is now based on a year after when the presurgical mammo was done??).
I asked if the ongoing hard lump or the inability to properly compress due to pain at its site and stiffness from the foreign body would interfere with imaging, and she dodged the question. I think she simply does not know if it is harder to find recurrences when Biozorbs are in place and is perhaps hoping that by subtly changing the goal post to one year after the last mammogram instead of six months after my surgery, the thing will have resorbed by then.
I was surprised at the new "one year since last mammogram" recommendation, instead of six months, and asked if maybe one should at least do an ultrasound at six months post surgery because I did not have XRT, (plus that is what she had talked about at the last visit), and have discomfort, but she said US without mammo is not at all helpful (?) . She started telling me that the protocol is to do mammo six months *after XRT* ( true) and because I did not have XRT, we can just go to the usual annual schedule which made no sense to me. I asked if maybe the fact I did not do XRT would make one want to do it at six months postop rather than a year, sooner rather than later, to make sure CA is not coming back (plus last visit in January she had specifically said "six months after treatment".)Why would one push the date out further just because I did not have XRT? I did not t even have an MRI as I could not tolerate it. I wonder if she is hoping for the Biozorb to be less of an interference with longer time? Most of what I read, and what the MO had recommended, is to do mammograms every six months for a few years, and that was with women who had XRT and who would in theory have lower recurrence risk. Her logic makes no sense and I think it was all a "make things up as you go along" attempt to not address Biozorb concerns.
She added on that if I worry about mammogram pain, I should take motrin before. This showed she had not really looked at my chart, which is replete with information about my chronic pain and the fact I am on round the clock maximum motrin as well as maximum strength Ultram. When I noted I already am on full strength motrin round the clock etc., instead of saying she had forgotten that she just said "take more." Take more than recommended maximum doses, really?
Maybe the lump and discomfort will settle down and go away, maybe not. I certainly am not interested in another surgery to get it out, absent cancer. I am not sure why she used the Biozorb, as I was not going to do XRT and repeatedly told her, so we did not need a marker for XRT, and I was not interested in cosmetic issues either, I just wanted the smallest surgery that would be safe to get rid of the BCA so as not to flare my chronic pain issues, so the Biozorb's marketed alleged cosmetic value is of no value to me.
So meanwhile I am stuck with it, and her, unless symptoms get much worse. In hindsight I should have questioned using it more but who knows, maybe the distortion and dent without a Biozorb would cause more discomfort and twisted scarring than I have now.
I think we still have a lot to learn about the Biozorb, and that unless you are a famous and/or important person, it seems to be getting harder and harder to find docs who do not overload their schedules and just rush around, and who would be willing to honestly discuss uncertainties. She and her husband are already very wealthy people (based on a variety of things I know about them) so why crowd her schedule so much that she barely has time to talk? My guess is she is filling her records with how great I am doing postop and that I have no concerns, or worse, that I am argumentative and a difficult person.
After a decade of autoimmune problems, Dx 10/2017 at age 63, IDC, Left, 9mm, Oncotype 13, Stage IA, Grade 1, 0/5 nodes, ER+/PR+, HER2-, 11/22/2017 Lumpectomy, Arimidex. Declined radiation.