YIKES! Nothing like the 5 blind men describing an elephant. In my search
for the WTF is wrong, THREE TIMES I spent about 2 weeks in the hospital
having 9,843.8 tests. The first resulted in the shruggin of shoulders and
an Rx for physical therapy (Germans believe that almost anythng can be
cured by exercise and fresh air.) The second one resulted in a finding
that, despite the fact that none of the comorbidities were at all severe
and were totally under control with the meds, that together they
conspeired to plague me with the total fatigue problem. The 3rd and final
episode of testing me almost beyond all endurance almost resulted in yet
another " We have no clue" The doctor in charge and his 5 student doctors
had another go at doing the pulling the arms while your resist routine ,
hitting the knee with the ruber hammer, all that stuf. Then he gave me
some l-dopa and came back in an hour.. I was like being at a tent revival
with a faith healer and the healer put his hand on my head and BOOM! I was
healed! I could get out of bed on my own; walk a bit to a chair, sit down,
stand up walk about 10 feet ,etc. It truly was like a miracle. I know there
are diseases that mimick Parkingson's and they have to be careful not to
misdiagnose the patient, because if that's wrong, the treatment will be
wrong and that wouldn't end well. But it surprises me that this simple
test wouldn't have been done somewhere along the way as standard practice.
If he hadn't done that test, I would have ended up in a nursing home, and
not much more than a lump of protoplasm that barely spoke (but when she
did, she had a vocabulary of a sailor )and never moved under her own
steam, just waiting to die. I certainly hope that at least the doctor who
tried seeing what my response to l -dopa would be has incorporated it into
the prescribed tests. Who knows how many other folks there are whose
llives would have been dramatically improved by that.. As unpleasant as my
loooong search for a diagnosis was, I still consider myself the most
fortunate human on the planet because all the stars in the universe had to
be in the the right h place in the right time with the right answer. So
many decisions I made over the past 15 years led me to land here. Decision
to move to Germany to be with our son and his family, our decision to move
into the neighborhood where I selected the Primary care doctor just because
he was only a block from our flat, who turned our to be fantastic, and who
had a friend who was a neurologist and referred me to her, and, my
neurologist just happened be on the panel that assessed the l-dopa pump for
use in the EU, so she knew alot about it and I got to be the 2nd person to
have one (excluding the folks who participated in the field trials.)an My
German insurance pays for every cent of it. 6,000 Euros every month for
just the med for the pump., as well as almost every medical expense I have.
The only thing I've paid for has been my rollator, and that was because I
declined the free one and wanted one that has a seat and a basket, so that
was about 250 EUro Have no clue what the hospitalizations cost because the
hospitals bill the insurance directly, and insurance pays them directly and
sends me a notice that they've paid the hospital. Am I a lucky duck or
what?!!