At every appointment for my little guy, K., the Dr. has said he has a lot of fluid in his ears. Finally, at his 9 month appointment, they referred him on to the ENT. Since his referral was for "chronic otitis media", his first visit was an appointment with the audiologist and then the ENT. The audiologist agreed that he had lots of fluid and proceeded to talk into a microphone at different decibels and if K. looked up in response to his name, a monkey playing the cymbals magically appeared. Lets just say that the musical monkey only appeared on 1 occasion and it was after the audiologist was screaming. So, the $249 conclusion (literally, we got the bill) to the microphone test was that there was fluid in his ears causing him not to hear. Then, we had an hour break and saw the ENT who, wait for it.... said K. had fluid in his ears. So, now that 3 doctors had established this, he said we had 2 options, give him medicine for 3 weeks and come back for another $249 appointment, or go ahead and do tubes. Since B. had tubes, and A. had tubes, we opted to go ahead and put them in. Since that time, we've had a preop appointment with our primary (he said the fluid was still there) and another appointment with the ENT (the fluid, yet again, still there) before we finally had the 10 minute surgery today.
I have several thoughts on this...
1) I'm half excited that K. will be able to hear and half scared that my little chill guy will hear how much his sister talks and turn into a whining kiddo
and, on a more global scale,
2) Why exactly, did this kid have to spend over 2 hours in a waiting room, see 3 different doctors, and spend well over $3,000 for a culmination of 10 minutes. In fact, the surgery according to our Dr. usually takes approximately 5 mins and 22 seconds (apparently he times himself) but K. took longer because his fluid had thickened so much (EEEWWW!!) So, I guess my question should be why does it take over 2 hours in a waiting room, see 3 different doctors, and spend well over $3,000 for a supposed 5 min and 22 second procedure? Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate doctors being thorough and I understand the need to be careful when putting a 10 month old under anesthesia but there has to be a better way. I guess if I knew the answer and felt like arguing about it for the next several years of my life, I could run for president. Since that isn't in my plans, I go to the follow up appt and pay another $249 to hopefully hear that the fluid is no longer there.
It is just a horrible process, Sarah, no matter how you slice it. I know they want to be cautious but I am convinced the number of appointments is to pad the bill. E had chronic ear infections for 3 months before I could even get the go ahead from the pediatrician to go to the ENT. After that, it went pretty quick. But we had 4 hours of waiting for the first surgery (at 10 months) and 3 hours the second time (28 months - also had adenoids removed then). Getting her up so early and not letting her eat or drink, then keeping her waiting, was so not cool. I thankfully can't complain about the bill because our insurance somehow covered 100% and I just had office visit co-pays.
ReplyDeleteOnly recommendation is to seriously monitor his hearing. E is still having trouble though it is hard to say how much because she won't sit still for the hearing tests. But last time she registered nearly 40% hearing impairment. And now she may have "Auditory Processing Disorder" meaning she can probably hear what you are saying but it doesn't compute in her brain. This is quite possibly because she couldn't hear for so long that she's turned into a very visual-learning person. So more specialists, testing, and co-pays to come.
I really hope you caught K's early enough and that he only needs the one set of tubes and all will be well. Except for the sister whining part. For that, you're on your own =)
Shannon,
ReplyDeleteSorry to hear about E's experience!! Thankfully k went first for the surgery so we got to the center at 7 and we were home by 9. It is quite an experience for a baby and for mommies. I will take your advice and monitor his hearing though I will say I was actually surprised at how bad his hearing was. I didn't really notice until they told me. It seemed pretty obvious after they told me though. Good luck with your next round of appointments. Please let me know if I can help, sometimes kids with auditory processing disorders go to OT. I may ne able to help you navigation through that process. Good luck!