Dr. Nadler of the Rural Health Clinic: Your patient is ill because she is being beaten up, do you have no training?

I got a phone call over the weekend from a woman I hardly know, and may have talked to five times in five years. Why she called me I'm still not sure, but people trust me, and she needed to talk to someone.

Though I had showered and prepped to get to the store I decided to answer the phone, but quickly.

This was not a short call, and in the end, I made a decision to act on the information.

The reason I'm shooting this story from the blog is that it is another example of the nightmare here in the KRV, called the Rural Health Clinic.

She really likes Dr. Nadler

When she told me her wounds, her broken limb, was from an altercation with her boyfriend, I asked her who her doctor was and she told me, my former doctor Nadler.

I said he didn't know that these wounds were from abuse?

She said, "no, I didn't tell him."

Regardless if she told him, he should have had some training. Most battered women lie to everyone because they are afraid and have no where to go.

She is a completely textbook case. Being beaten with nowhere to go.

Apparently, she likes Dr. Nadler, but not enough to trust him with this information. But he should know better.

In less than five minutes on the phone it was obvious she has been through a lot of violence, and is nervous admitting to the reality of it, so she lies. Victims lie a lot, out of fear.

Tonight I spoke with my stepfather who has lymphoma and is battling cancer. He told me as a man that in his life he has encountered many doctors who still think women's illnesses are in "their minds." I explained I had recently dumped Dr. Nadler because of that same complaint, not necessarily misogyny, but lack of respect, a real Freudian model, of women's health.

Example, when I first saw him in 2007, I complained of Insomnia, palsy of the hands, hair loss, shortness of breath, and weight loss. I was prescribed Prozac. He explained my "personality" which obviously bothered him, away with drugs.

Now, I see clearly from the case of this beaten and broken female patient, that he ignored her obvious problem, being accident prone. Gosh, that would be nice.

If a man saw him regularly with bruising, breaks, and other things, he might have wondered. But apparently he can let overt abuse come in and out of the office for years!

Again, there's no bond money for people who treat patients like this. The boy's club at this hospital. Just for my information is this perception everywhere in medicine still?

It must be as they only started talking breast cancer, ovarian cancer, different heart attack symptoms, regarding women in the past few years.

I just didn't see it clearly until this phone call. Yes, I experienced it, as Dr. Nadler could not handle any emotion, especially mine. So, I got referred a few times so he didn't have to hear it.

And now I will be meeting with Greg Davis the manager of this clinic on Friday to discuss my care and how that will be corrected so my health is better and not worse. Dr. Nadler, as is expected, chooses not to address this situation and will be hiding in the other room while we discuss his malpractice.

I'll give a full report as I'm quite concerned what is going to happen to this woman. More later in the week...(RHC Product Review...no stars)