Where Have All The Doctors Gone?

My first order of business upon my discharge from Silver Lake was to see Dr. Katzenelenbogen. As I mentioned earlier, he refused to take me off Prednisone without consulting with my pulmonologist. Just one teensy problem: I didn't have a pulmonologist. In Columbia I had dozens of 'em, so all I had to do was choose one, right? Uh-huh. That's what I thought, too. Believe it or not, I couldn't find one lung guy in the whole farkahkteh* hospital who was willing to take me on as a private patient. One was not accepting new patients. One was only treating TB patients. One was too busy teaching. One simply didn't want to get involved; he must have seen my 250 page chart. One didn't accept any insurance, and several wouldn't accept my insurance. One smelled like old muenster cheese. Okay, I made that one up. But I literally must have called ten or twelve guys. I figured it made the most sense to get someone at Columbia so they would have easy, unfettered access to my records. Wasn't happening. So I got on the horn and called the two Jewish medical referral services, Refuah Resources and Echo. Refuah really didn't have anyone they recommended highly. Echo recommended a Dr. Louis DePalo of Mount Sinai. I called for an appointment and was pleasantly surprised when the receptionist gave me one just a few weeks away...believe me, when you're dealing with these hot-shot Manhattan doctors, that's a rarity. And they even accepted my insurance! And so it came to pass that I became Dr. DePalo's patient. He's been my Pulmonologist for about five months now, and our relationship is still a work in progress. I know it may sound a bit bizarre to talk about my "relationship" with my doctor, but Dr. DePalo is not your average, run-of-the-mill doctor. He's a character and a half. And, of course, so am I. So anyway, got the scenario? I have an appointment set up with him, but we haven't met yet. Okay...wait till you hear about our close encounter of the weird kind!

*The Yiddish word "farkahkteh" is really difficult to translate, so please just use your imagination or insert the disparaging adjective of your choice.