Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Regence is awesome and 800 mg Motrin

So Monday morning I feel a nasty pain on my right shoulder after icing it all night on Sunday. At 10:00 I called Regence (my insurance carrier) and Debbie x4856 at Regence told me I could go to the Ballard Sports Medicine Clinic to check out one of their Doctors, since they are a PPO.

At 10:07, I called Amanda at the Sports Medicine Clinic, pleaded my case and said she'll see what she can do and call me back. At 10:15, she got me an appointment for 2:00 PM. As in less than 4 hours from now. She is just awesome! Not only was this any appointment, but this was an appointment with Dr. Hsu who is an Orthopedic Surgeon who specializes in shoulder injuries. I was in luck!

At 13:45. I checked in with the front desk, filled out paperwork and by13:50 I was done. At exactly 14:00 I was seen by a nurse who did preliminaries. She then referred me to the X-Ray tech on staff who took four X-rays of my shoulder. At 14:20 I was seen by Dr. Hsu. He looked at the X-Rays and made the diagnosis. His diagnosis was that I don't have any serious injuries in my right shoulder. Thank Goodness! He did some other tests and said that I pulled my upper right bicep tendon. I should rest, ice it and take ibuprofen. He told me to take 4 days off from working out and then gradually work out and see how it works. Light at first, and work up to full intensity by the end of next week. If things deteriorate, do a follow up. However I should be fine!

At 14:30 I was out of the clinic. Done! This was the most efficient phone call to specialist that I've seen in awhile. Also should I need Physical Therapy they have it on site at the Ballard Sports Clinic. It's a pretty cool thing to know that my insurance carrier can take care of things rather quickly.

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