Urologist (No, MYologist!)

I've got to preface this with the following information: I count this doctor in the same category as Dr. Umstead. Consider yourself warned!

I had to call the urologist, Dr. Barkley, because the stent he put in (or tried to put in then had to have someone else do it four days later...) was only good for 2-3 months. Finally got an appointment with him on Monday afternoon at 3:45. I'm finally taken back at 4:15. After the preliminary stuff with the nurse, she puts me in a room. The whole time I'm in there, I can hear him talking to someone about his plans for next weekend, laughing, joking, the whole deal. At 4:55 (yes, 40 minutes after I was put in a room) he finally comes in and tells me to fill him in on what's happened since he last saw me. So I tell him. Mind you, all of this information is in all of the many pages of paperwork that I was required to come in early to fill out. He was surprised to hear that I was going through chemo and interrupted with "Are you septic?" I swear to you, I am not joking. The man asked me if I was septic. It took quite a bit of self-control not to reply with some sarcastic comment about being a total idiot and exposing the people who work for him to my toxicity. Ugh.... Anyway, he goes "Well, we're going to schedule an appointment for you to go to the hospital so we can take out the stent that's in there and put in a new one" then gets up to walk out the door a whopping 3 minutes after he came in the room. Whoa, there, buddy, I've got some questions for you! Is it inpatient or outpatient? Am I going under? Do I even need a new stent put in? I mean, you never even looked at me, so maybe the tumor's shrunk enough that I don't need one anymore. And I have a CT scan scheduled for Friday afternoon. Will I be out in time? Or am I going to get stuck in the hospital for five days again because you can't seem to figure out how to get it in? Oh, and how about the horrid pain that I have when I empty my bladder? I'm not even kidding you, by the time I caught him, we were standing in the hallway. He tells me it's outpatient, he'll schedule me first so I should be able to do the CT scan, hopefully I won't have to stay this time, and the pain is from the stent, there's nothing he can do about it. That's it.

So let me just tell you how thrilled I am about this whole situation. I mean, I know that it needs to be done. Friday will be 3 months to the day since I had the first one put in. The last thing I need is to start developing stones around the old one (which is what I was told could happen). If I had more time to play with, I would definitely be shopping around for a different urologist. At this point, though, it really needs to be done, the sooner, the better. I'm just hoping for an easier time this go-round and then the possibility of never having to deal with this guy again...