Access Now Urgent CareWheaton

As an overweight woman, I'm unfortunately used to complaints not being taken seriously. After I described severe gut cramping, the PA commented that it sounded like I wasn't experiencing much if any pain. (My gut cramps were hitting a 6 or 7 on the pain scale daily, a number I don't use lightly and didn't want any medication for.) After a week of gastrointestinal problems where I have struggled to take in up to 400 or 500 calories a day of solid food, I was advised to make sure the fluids I was pushing to avoid severe dehydration were never sugar-sweetened. No medical explanation was offered, leaving me to conclude the advice was more geared toward my continuing to lose weight than my not falling over from lack of energy. Also, other doctors have routinely been able to find my heartbeat with a stethoscope despite my size; I'm not sure whether your practice needs better stethoscopes or better training. In the end, my reasonable concern re: food poisoning was largely dismissed due to my symptoms being "not acute enough" (after 8 days of pain, fever, and serious gi involvement, on top of repeated exposure to a food item recalled for that reason) but no testing was done or offered -- in fact, I was told it would not be done -- and no explanation was offered of what "more acute" meant so that I could feel reassured rather than dismissed. I don't assume that I know better than a doctor what's wrong, given a doctor who listens & performs appropriate tests. One who minimizes or outright dismisses symptoms, declines to do any tests, and offers only the vaguest of explanations does not, however, inspire confidence in a patient who is suffering. Giving what amounts to weight-loss advice to someone who's been largely unable to eat for over a week on top of all that? This is why overweight people are sometimes so reluctant to seek medical attention when sick. I'm giving 3 stars rather than 1 or 2 for quality of care only because the person I saw did prescribe an antibiotic for whatever problem I have in the "related cluster" of [unspecified] possible causes for my symptoms, so I have some hope of feeling better in a few days.