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In Remembrance
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Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,002
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In Remembrance
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,002
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After working as a bankruptcy and civil trial attorney for ten years, I then switched law areas completely, as I was bored, and worked as a work comp defense attorney litigating potential fraud cases (for the insurance co.s or employers.) I loved reading hundreds of medical reports each month. What's so weird, after reading probably (maybe) thousands of medical reports, I never, ever saw one TOS case. That's how rare it is diagnosed - at least in So. Cal. at the time.
However, having not seen TOS cases myself, I still HEARD of them after I myself developed TOS, and at least in CA, and perhaps at least in Orange County, there really is no question that given the right set of facts, neurogenic TOS is a repetitive injury. There are admitted TOS cases in OC, and that's a fact.
So I'm really shocked, truly shocked, that whoever that doc was / is, would say something so utterly false and wrong to you as the patient.
But, I must say there are what we used to call "whores" (please excuse the phrase) doctors who, for the payment of their exam fee of $1500 to $3500, would say whatever that particular side wanted. I never, ever used those doctors because the judges knew who they were, and I actually saw judges say, "you know what, attorney, here's what I think of your med report", and toss the report in the trash can to make a statement! So the judges and the attorneys know who these "wash-out" (when a doc gives no permanent disability when you know darn well there is), or "buy a doc" reports, and it really is an embarrassment, BUT, for some stupid reason, the insurance adjusters, (or hack attorneys for the work comp patient), still insist on getting these baloney reports. Again, it goes over like a big stink in the court room usually. However, there are sad times when a judge may fall for one of these false reports, and it really is an ethical shame that a doctor, who takes a Hippocratic Oath, would not help a patient. Another big offender are / is the employer clinics, where if you're hurt, yes, they give you immediate medical care, but again, the no-spine doctor says, "oh, you're fine, take this pain med and get back to work." I've seen a few really sad occasions when the worker really needed surgery or time off to heal, and yet was sent RIGHT BACK, sometimes right then, back to work.
If you see this hack again, here are NINDS, NIH and Mayo clinic articles that CLEARLY state the injury can come from repetitive work movements. And, frankly, unless you have an outside hobby, or independent contractor work, or had an accident outside of work, then one has to look at the place where we all spend the majority of our waking hours, and that is our work. And then, if our work involves long hours on the computer, or some kind of repetitive work such as wall paper hanging, airplane mechanic, sewing, anything with a lot of strong arm movements or fine hand manipulations, then one has to look at diagnosing a repetitive strain type of injury. There are very, very few people with "extra ribs" that cause TOS...
Most of the people I have personally met in So. Cal. got neuro TOS from overwork on a computer - next comes a car accident. And then one was from being in surgery and left in a compromising position on the table too long. We have one person here on the Board who developed neuro TOS from an immunization that I am assuming made scar tissue in the relevant areas.
So here are some links:
Yahoo or google TOS, there are now (and this is relatively new) some good articles about TOS. I'll try to find some links below.
http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/t...c/thoracic.htm
http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/library/DS/00800.html
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/t...tsyndrome.html
God bless you on your path to healing. I happen to think highly of Dr. Sanders - and also Dr.s Brantigan and Annest in Denver. Annest did my surgery. Hopefully you can go back to Denver and maybe see the other two for your second opinions.
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