I have spent years battling with a deviated septum that has caused me many health problems. I have been told by three doctors that I have a severely deviated septum that needs to be corrected with surgery. I have been waiting all of these years because of job changes that created changes to my insurance and relocations that have caused changes with my doctors. I have chronic headaches, dizziness, insomnia, nosebleeds, have episodes where I have passed out from lack of oxygen, etc. My local ENT doctor told me that I was a complicated case and would need some degree of reconstructive (plastic surgery) and that he wasn't comfortable doing the surgery and that no one in the area was good enough to take it on. He referred me to Dr. Park. I have waited years to finally have an appointment with a surgeon to schedule my surgery, and once referred, I had to wait 3 months to get in with Dr. Park. When the appointment came, a doctor Hyde was the one that came in. He told me that he worked for Dr. Park, which immediately caught me off guard since I had waited so long to see Dr. Park. When Mr. Park finally came in (accompanied by three medical students) he entered the room with a certain arrogance about him. I immediately could tell that this wasn't going to go well. His demeanor was that of a stuck up, full of himself, holier than thou surgeon that every potential patient dreads. He began to examine me, spouting out medical terms such as "lateral collapse" to the student that was updating my medical record. Meanwhile all of the students are staring at me, which as you can imagine, was very uncomfortable. Mr. Park told me that I had about 20% usage of my right nostril and called me a "mild case". He said "some people can't breathe out of their noses at all". He completely dismissed me, and made me feel like I was just in search of a nose job. I was referred to Dr. Park because I was told by a highly reputable surgeon that I would need some aesthetic surgery in addition to the medical aspect. I never mentioned plastic surgery to either doctor. Mr. Park kept trying to convince me that I didn't need surgery, and kept using lingo that only surgeons would understand. When I would ask him to clarify he would respond with " As I said", or " Again". He was talking AT me and down on me. I almost started crying, and my frustration was clearly displayed on my face and with my body language. Dr. Park stood to my side so I had to turn my body just to speak to him and look up at him. He told me that I didn't need surgery, even though I was desperately spouting off about all of the years of suffering, the struggle to breathe, the lack of sleep and of sanity from living a life with oxygen deprivation. He dismissed me with nothing but a recommendation to do a sleep study, that maybe I had sleep apnea. I am back to square one. After years of effort to get my nose fixed, I was pushed to the side; talked to like a girl that was just trying to get a nose job. I was in tears the entire 2 hour drive back home, back to square one. I hope that Mr. Park will be forced to come to terms with how he has set myself and others back on their battle to improve their quality of life. read more
