Call From The Specialists Office
[ Tuesday December 6th 2016 at 11:29 am ]
The clinic where my family doctor is referring me to called. I have been asked to complete a very thorough intake questionaire. I also need to speak with my pharmacist to get a medication history.
I did some research earlier in the week. I now doubt I even should be going to the specialist for a knee injection. It isn't the specialist that I was researching or questioning. I already have confidence in him. The fundamental reason for sending me is what I am questioning.
In summary I've reached the conclusion that the MRI machine wasn't configured to assess the health of the cartilage. Yet that is what the report noted and was adopted by my family doctor and surgeon. I now think the report is bogus for how it is being used. I need to go back to my family doctor for another discussion.
Using simple math it appears the MRI of my right knee joint was set at the rate of every 0.4 to 0.5 cm. At the time of this MRI examine I had the classic symptoms of a meniscus tear. The setting is perfectly legtimate for this purpose. I am not blaming the hospital, doctors or physiotherapist. They were trying to confirm what both my family doctor and physiotherapist thought was wrong with my right knee.
This week I found a 15 page document that goes into detail on performing MRI's for what the MRI report noted as the affected cartilage in my right knee joint. It is talking about a sample rate being every 0.02 to 0.04 cm is needed for the results my MRI scan detailed. It very well could be a train wreck in my right knee joint and the past 20 months of physiotherapy was a big mistake before pursuing knee surgery. What I am reading and the math I've done leads me to the conclusion that at least 10x the images are needed to make a cartilage health assessment.
Now my concern is if I consent to the nerve block injection and don't feel my right knee joint for ~6 months I could literally destroy the cartilage in my right knee joint because of not having pain warn me. This in turn would rob me of my remaining mobility, increasing my pain and I'd be unable to manage day to day life when it wears off leaving me in an absolute terrible predicament.
If the MRI report is legtimately accurate what is being proposed makes sense. In theory stopping the pain and then pursuing physiotherapy would break the cycle and allow me to get started on the road to recovery. Yet when I had my last physiotherapy appointment the physiotherapist spent 10 minutes telling me I am needing knee surgery. Indepentedly I found an article prepared by a sports injury doctor about the cartilage the MRI report noted. I have virtually every major symptom noted. I trust the symptoms over a report. I need to speak with my family doctor to resolve this.