Update: The shoulder pain mystery (with bonus primary doc mini-rant!)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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Since you’ve all been holding your collective breaths waiting for an update to my “Mystery of the Shoulder Pain” thread . . .

After a very frustrating three-month-long round of seeing four docs (primary-ortho-primary) for agonizing shoulder pain that switches sides and runs down my arms, I may be getting closer to a possible answer. Thus far the answers had been, respectively, bicep strain; torn rotator cuff; and muscle strain from coughing.

I’m particularly pissed-off with my primary care doc. I went to her for the second time yesterday for help, told her I’m in excruciating pain and need help with dx/pain management, and basically got told I’m a pussy and go home and take two Motrin. This is the same doc who told Ms. Shark that she had strained her back (“take two Motrin and don’t call me in the morning”) when she actually had Guilliame-Barre syndrome with rapidly ascending paralysis.

Time to look for a competent primary doc, methinks.

Anyhoo, the problem may be a C5/C6 disc issue (herniated/degenerated/arthritic/whatevah) causing the pain and sorrow. I went to the ER today after another excruciating night of no sleep and asked to be euthanized; by the grace of God I saw a lovely young doc who basically said “WTF? Dude, you’re in agony because your neckal area may be rotted!” He gave me actual painkilling drugs and called my primary care doc to tell her (politely) she’s an idiot and that I needed a specialist referral immediately.

I’m seeing a spine specialist tomorrow and getting an MRI. Pray for my diskettes!

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I thought floppy disks were obsolete!
Wishing you a speedy recovery. I had a mysterious L2 problem a few years ago - I couldn’t trace it to anything specific in my workout routine, but man was it painful! I almost “whited out” one time due to the pain shooting down my leg. Fortunately, it resolved with just PT and rest.

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Yowch, dude!

I’ll be relieved if I can get a DX and non-surgical treatment plan (and some pain meds that actually work).

I had convinced myself I have breast or lung cancer – thanks WebMd!

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I worked at IBM in the '80s, so I have cervical diskettes, unlike these kids today with fancy USB discs!

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Not for nothing, but one of the reasons I left my last PCP was because of his “take some motrin and call me in two weeks if it still hurts” comments. He would say it every single time. At first, I didn’t think anything of it, he’s the doc (I was 17 or 18), he knows best, right? I’d go in with this or that, go home, take some motrin or apap a few times a day and after a week or two I’d go back, tell him it still hurt and he’d write a script for a muscle relaxant or T3s or something. After a few years of this, I (totally innocently), tried to get in front of it. Something or other was hurting. I let it go for two full weeks, taking motrin a few times a day, then called and went in to see him. His response, the usual, take motrin for two weeks, call me if it still hurts. I said “I figured you’d say that, so I held off calling you and I’ve been taking taking motrin for a few weeks already, but I can still hardly move my neck”. He told me to give it another two weeks.
At that point, I just assumed he was trying to turn everything into two appointments.

I was thrilled the first time I saw my new doctor. Went in for some kind of pain, he told me what to do and I asked him how long I should wait to come back. His response was that it would be a waste of money for you to come back, if this doesn’t clear up in a week or two, we’ll just send you right over to radiology (or PT), but there’s no point in you coming here for me to tell you that, just call the office and I’ll set it up.

That was pretty nice. I really like him.

Now, it should be noted that my new doctor works under the theory that if you’re in pain, often times it takes a painkiller or muscle relaxant to get you to stop walking around all goofy which gives the muscle a chance to unspasm and/or the nerve to unpinch. Sure, with my first doc, 2-4 weeks might have been enough time for the pain to go away, just based on time alone, but new doc gives me some Soma (carisoprodol) and it feels like the ice pick is pulled out of my back in 48 hours.
My old doc, OTOH, has made the comment ‘the goal is to get you off meds, not get you on them’ (or something like that). So, maybe he didn’t want to write scripts, but I still felt like it was bullshit that I could go in with pain and be told to come back in two weeks, especially, when I told him I had already been in pain for two weeks, so lets just pretend like this is the second appointment.

TLDR, don’t feel bad moving to a new doctor if your’s isn’t a good fit (my mom still sees my original doc and loves him). Also, always remember that a cutter (the ortho) will want to cut. Surgery might be the correct answer, but the ortho will start there while a PCP will usually start with some less drastic measures first.