The Neurologist

Today was an early morning as we left the hotel at 7:15 am to pick up Jocelyn before heading to the neurology appointment. Jocelyn was just finishing up work at 7:30 am when we pulled in. She hopped in the car and off we drove to the Georgetown Public Hospital. Jocelyn had the appointment card that we needed to turn in in order to see the neurologist.

We arrived shortly before 8:00 am. The place was packed full of people waiting to see the doctor. Every seat taken with more people standing along the perimeter. We followed Jocelyn down the hall and around the corner where we dropped off Aria's appointment card and continued on our way to the waiting area.

The system here is quite different than we are used to. First you must show up during a specific time frame in the morning to drop off your appointment card. After you drop it off, you wait. You could be the first one called back or the last of the day. So you wait and you wait. And every time the nurse comes out with a stack of charts, you hope and pray that she has your chart in her hands.

We were lucky and called back for our appointment around 9:30 am. We walked into a tiny room with two men sitting. Neither introduced themselves. They were rushed trying to get through as many patients as possible. No temperature was taken. No heart or lungs were listened to. We simply told them what was happening. They looked at her head and confirmed that she indeed had hydrocephalus.

We had thought Dr. Duhki would be doing the procedure and had read great things about him. By the end of our appointment, we realized the older doctor in the room would be doing the procedure. We are praying that he knows what he's doing.

We thought we were finally getting close to get Aria the help she so desperately needs. But then we told that Aria's surgery is considered elective. Elective surgeries are preformed only on Fridays. And the next two Fridays are booked. Her surgery was scheduled for June 21st - 18 days from now. How can they not think this in an emergency? We are heartbroken to think she'll need to endure this pain for 18 more days.

There is a very small chance that the surgery scheduled for Friday may need to be rescheduled. If this happens, they would move Aria's surgery to Friday. But if that doesn't happen, she will need to wait until June 21st.

Tomorrow morning we have an 8:00 am MRI appointment at Mercy Hospital, the private hospital here in Georgetown. It will be a sedated MRI so please lift Aria up in prayers. And pray that they will decide to squeeze her surgery in this coming Friday.