Second of a series:
It is difficult to obtain adequate medical attention when you are an invalid.
Over
five years ago, I lost my ability to stand up. Since then, I have to be
raised using an electrical motor or a lift. Since then, I don't get physically
examined when I go to the doctor because nobody in their office can help me get
up to the examination table. All I get to do is just talk with him or her about
my ailments.
The last time I visited my primary doctor, I was asking him to give me the name of barrier cream to help me prevent the development of a chair sore that I was
sure had started to break in my derrière. He immediately offered to examine me
and asked me to stand up and climb to the examining table. When he realized I
was not able to do it, he asked my husband to help me, but my husband is also
an old person and can not lift me anymore. For that same reason, I stopped
going to the dentist, to the urologist, to the gynecologist, and to many other
doctors. No doctor's office, that I know of, has
the equipment to lift patients from a wheelchair to the examining table.
To give you a sense of what it's like to lose your capacity to stand and walk on your own, I'll tell you that I haven't been able to weigh in a doctor's office in over eight years. I have no idea how much I weigh.
