Saying good-bye, Doc

How do you choose a doctor? Most of the readers of this column have made moves from one city to another, and have had to line up a new doc for the family. It’s not an easy task.

We actually moved from town to town only once, and when we arrived in Peachtree City, I had thought through and written down my list of priorities. In no particular order, I had to find a church, a library, and a family doctor.

There was only one doc in town and we started out together, becoming friends as well as patients. He supported the development of the emergency medical services and as a newly minted EMT, then a paramedic, I worked in his office for about 10 years.

He was everything we needed for our generally healthy lives, and we never got around to spreading the burden among a pediatrician, a GYN, an orthopedist or a cardiologist. With the sole and devastating exception of our second daughter’s illness, we’ve had relatively few maladies in our 50 years together.

When Dr. Drake left here with his own health problems, I drifted a bit until Unnisa Faiyaz opened her practice and we placed ourselves in her hands. She’s good, listens carefully, and I like her personally as well as professionally. Dave, however, was uncomfortable about seeing a woman doctor, so I went with him to Bruce Perlman.

(Why are men like that? Until fairly recently, women have had to entrust their most intimate concerns to male health providers and if we expressed embarrassment, we were often patronized like children.)

All of the above is to lead into at least one new priority I’d recommend to anyone searching for a doctor. Choose one that is younger than you are, way younger, so she doesn’t retire before you’re through with her.

And which is more important, a doc just out of med school, her brain just packed with the latest ideas, or an old guy who has seen rashes like yours for 40 years and writes a prescription he’s used ever since it came out?

That’s not a rhetorical question. I have pondered it long and hard, and if this imaginary veteran medic also has an insurance clerk who knows the ins and outs of Medicare and backup plans, that might be the deciding factor in my decision.

This column has veered off-course. I sat down to write it as catharsis for the sorrow I’m feeling. Bruce Perlman has retired – and worse, somehow we missed the retirement bash hosted by his successor. Our emotions are mixed: glad for Bruce, sorry for us, and furious with ourselves for missing the open house.

We both had it in our calendars as 12 noon last Thursday. Then we started Christmas shopping and doing errands until precisely 5 p.m.

Why 5 p.m.? I don’t know: the end of the business day, I suppose. We were both so sure it was 5 p.m., Dave muttered as we drove toward the office that parking would be horrendous.

Parking was actually very simple, since only three cars were in the parking lot. No party in sight. The person in the waiting room was definitely convincing when she said the party was over. She was running a vacuum cleaner.

I wanted to cry. I did cry, actually. I had spent a good 10 minutes jotting down some notes in case anyone asked me to speak. Anyone in the same room with Bruce Perlman is a long shot to get a hundred words in, so maybe it’s better I wasn’t there. But I’m on my turf now, and I get to say what I want.

Here’s what I’d have said:

Dr. Perlman, we started to see you as a sort of maintenance doctor. We were in relatively good health, a little hypertension here, a dash of bronchitis there.

But the first thing we know, you’ve diagnosed one or the other of us with high cholesterol, arthritis, vertigo, urinary bladder incontinence, depression, coronary artery disease, mitral valve prolapse, ear wax, Parkinsonism, and old age, to mention a few. (I know, I say Parkinsonism, you say Parkinson’s Disease. It’s my column, remember?)

You jobbed out most of our medical needs, and now you’re throwing what’s left to total strangers, and you’ll walk out the door a free man, leaving behind not so much as an e-mail address.

We’ll come see Dr. Bennett and Mrs. Eades, convinced by your glowing recommendation. Let’s see what they can do with the above. Bet they won’t job out two breaking hearts.

Thanks a lot, Bruce.

No, no sarcasm today.

Thanks indeed, Bruce, and Shalom.