I'm so torn about writing this review for all the world to see, but I can't be selfish, I must be truthful and let the cards fall where they may, so here goes!
I'm a 43 year old female and have been a doctorphobe for quite the majority of my adult life, beyond the average "nobody likes going to the doctor" stuff, I seriously had phobia of doctors. Only after my young daughter and I spent 2 years in the Pediatric cancer trenches, having totally neglected my own body while sleeping in a hospital chair (189 inpatient days), did it become painfully clear, that I myself would have to find a caregiver. When I absolutely couldn't put it off any longer, I scoured the web for doctors and read about everyone in my 5 mile radius (in Honolulu that's a ton of doctors). For some reason people just don't leave many reviews for doctors, resteraunts yeah, moving companies yeah, doctors, not so much, so I was surprised to see so many reviews for this Samuel Hawk. When I first tried to make an appointment, his phones were being upgraded and not working great which gave me a little more time to procrastinate and research this guy. I mean if I'm going to let him in my personal space and have to tell him personal things, I want to know what he's about. I prefer to think of it as thorough research, although I know there are those who would think of it as borderline excessive (read stalking), it's not!
So the first thing that got my attention, was the sheer number of reviews this guy had vs. any other physician in Honolulu, definitely a good sign! The second thing that got my attention was that he was LGBT "friendly", being a heterosexual single Mom, I'm ashamed to admit, I had never even realized that was something a doctor would even have to say. Holy *hit, that means there are LGBT "unfriendly" doctors, and just like that, MY doctor phobia seemed pale by comparison to what someone else who actually had to worry about "unfriendly" doctors would face:( So then, I was faced with the uncomfortable idea that, out of all the doctors in Honolulu, there is only one LGBT friendly (that I saw), and I'm not L,G,B or T., so what am I going to do? After some deliberation and soull searching, I decided that I shouldn't have to miss out on the best doctor in town, after all it said, "friendly", not "exclusive".
On my first visit, the office was sooo, not doctor "officy", that it took me off guard, I didn't know what I thought, it was clean and cozy, and not at all like any other doctors office I'd ever been to. If my phobia hadn't been on high alert, it would have totally relaxed me on the first visit, it was going to take more than cozy lobby and friendly staff to win me over! Anyway, short story long, I've been going there for a little over a year now. I've seen all of the doctors there for one thing or another and can say without hesitation that they are all very good doctors, Dr Hawk wouldn't hire them if they were not, but.........there is just no equal to Dr Hawk, sorry, I know, that's probably unfair to the other skilled medical professionals in the world, that's just how I feel.
The first thing he worked on was my hand, I wasn't even there for my hand pain, it had been injured 9 MONTHS prior in a bicycle accident. The tendon in my hand had started to contract and I had maybe 25% strength and grip, another doctor had given me 2 cortisone shots which seemed to have made it worse. I was actually there to see the psychotherapist, trying to make peace with the trauma of my daughter's Leukemia treatment. I mentioned my hand pain having no idea that it could even be helped so long after I damaged it, I had chalked it up to something that would probably need surgery when my daughter was healthy again and I could no longer stand the pain. Dr Hawk just stepped in at the therapist request to take a look and did some minor manipulations, literallly less than 5 minutes and what he did hurt like *ell while he did it, which I wasn't expecting and kind of irritated me to be honest. It wasn't all magical and instant, but within a few days the strength in my hand was returning and within a couple of weeks, I was back to 80% with no additional treatment. For most people this would be enough, my phobia would not be so easily deterred though, so I wrote it off as "probably just time that it healed" after almost a year. So when I found myself in the worst back pain I have ever experienced, I went to the ER (super logical, I know). They offered me pain medication and I declined, instead asking for imaging to be done of my spine, I'm thinking I've got some missing vital pieces or something it hurt so bad. Much to my surprise, the ER doctor comes back and says, CT scan says your spine is fine.......but, you have 2 nodules in your left breast, we sent the images to your doctor (Dr Hawk), this isn't something that can wait. WTF? **Okay don't worry, I'm still alive writing this review but Yelp is about to cut me off, there is more you should know though, sooo read more