Yesterday I ended up in Urgent Care as I have been having chills the last few days, and L ear reddened, cheeks flushed, ear fullness and so on. Figured I had Otitis Externa/Media.
When I was getting the left ear lavaged, it became very painful (had impacted cerumen obstructing tympanic membrane/eardrum) and then more so after curretting the wax out to see the eardrum that was very inflamed.
I was grimacing and saying "ouch" and holding my ear and the doctor said to me "I can't give you anything for pain since you're on Methadone but you can take Motrin"
I replied I couldn't take Nsaids for GI reasons so he then said "take tylenol" so I said "ok", then I went on to tell him that the Methadone worked specifically for my spinal pain, not bunion pain, not migraine pain, toothache pain, sinus pain and so on. Told him I wasn't asking for any pain medication just wanted him to be aware of the fact that the pain medication works to relieve my low back pain not every other pain I might incur.
The male nurse really gave me the cold shoulder ...
At the end, the doctor apologized for causing me increased pain in the ear and hoped that the sample medication and the eardrops would take care of the pain (cost me $80 for antibiotic eardrops) and he said he wished me well with my back endeavor as I had told him about the ADR possibility...
I guess working in Urgent Care these health care personnel might often see drug seeking behavior, however, I wish they could figure out when someone isn't drug seeking and educate themselves a bit more on Chronic pain and how medication for that works...
BTW, at the time I was the only patient in there so it wasn't a matter of not having time to ask about my medication history..
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