How do you know?
How do you know your formal diagnosis? Is it something you remember being told and you wrote it down? Did someone qualified to do so eg your oncologist, ever give you say an email, or letter or a reco...
Forum Discussion
Gosh, you’ve been let down a bit @Temple
your GP, surgeon, Oncologist and Radiation Oncologist should ALL be on every referral/blood test/ scan etc that is written for you since your diagnosis, surgery & treatment plan. If you change any of your medical team, they should be added/ removed from the list.
Re radiation .... usually this is a discussion, not a written thing ... hence recording all meetings is good, to go over it again later and take detailed notes of what was said. They SHOULD send a report to your team as well.
SO, Every time you see any one of your team, they should send a report to all the other members so that they are all in the picture. One may ‘pick up’ on something that the others may miss. It may be worth having their names written down in your journal, to remind them when you see them. Make sure you have their full first names and suburb they practise as well. My recent yearly scans and mri last month were sent to the wrong specialist as they sent it to a local doctor, not my surgeon in Sydney!
Sadly, many of us (particularly those in rural areas) haven’t had the use of a breast care nurse to help guide us and answer simple questions.
Contact your GP/surgeon’s office and request a copy of any other results including the reports on each, as you already have your pathology report. Your GP and/or specialist should talk you thru every report. I always request a copy of my bloods as well, just for comparison with earlier ones.
i have a big box that all my ‘cancer stuff’ gets put into, so it is all in the one spot .... X-rays, ultrasounds, scans, reports etc. then they are easy to find when you need them (you are expected to take your most recent scans with you, to the next one! (Even if THEY were the ones who did them!)
all the best xx
your GP, surgeon, Oncologist and Radiation Oncologist should ALL be on every referral/blood test/ scan etc that is written for you since your diagnosis, surgery & treatment plan. If you change any of your medical team, they should be added/ removed from the list.
Re radiation .... usually this is a discussion, not a written thing ... hence recording all meetings is good, to go over it again later and take detailed notes of what was said. They SHOULD send a report to your team as well.
SO, Every time you see any one of your team, they should send a report to all the other members so that they are all in the picture. One may ‘pick up’ on something that the others may miss. It may be worth having their names written down in your journal, to remind them when you see them. Make sure you have their full first names and suburb they practise as well. My recent yearly scans and mri last month were sent to the wrong specialist as they sent it to a local doctor, not my surgeon in Sydney!
Sadly, many of us (particularly those in rural areas) haven’t had the use of a breast care nurse to help guide us and answer simple questions.
Contact your GP/surgeon’s office and request a copy of any other results including the reports on each, as you already have your pathology report. Your GP and/or specialist should talk you thru every report. I always request a copy of my bloods as well, just for comparison with earlier ones.
i have a big box that all my ‘cancer stuff’ gets put into, so it is all in the one spot .... X-rays, ultrasounds, scans, reports etc. then they are easy to find when you need them (you are expected to take your most recent scans with you, to the next one! (Even if THEY were the ones who did them!)
all the best xx