Like so many people last year, I didn’t make it to a lot of regular medical appointments for most of 2020 because of the pandemic. I obviously did what I had to do when things weren’t great and I started regularly going to the dentist again after having some issues, but a lot of my routine appointments were put off and I figured I would do them when things were safer. And even though I have been vaccinated for about 6 months now, I didn’t get a chance to start planning routine appointments again until recently.
I might have forgotten to schedule them for longe but I did get an email alert from my insurance about some routine tests being due. They aren’t things I do every year, but it made sense I might be due for tests since I knew I skipped last year. So I tried to work on scheduling appointments around my work time (which isn’t easy now since I’m full-time and have to take time off to go). And I got a couple of things set up that started this week.
I had my regular well-woman checkup this week, which was one of the alerts I had gotten from my insurance. I found out when I got to the appointment, I wasn’t actually due for another year, but I figured I might as well do it all since I was already there. And while it’s not a fun appointment, it’s necessary to make sure I’m staying healthy and I don’t discover another random thing that is wrong with me. I’ve been feeling pretty ok lately, outside of some mental stress due to the pandemic, so I think everything is ok with me. But it will be good to know for sure.
I’ve got a few medical tests that I should have done last year but it was ok to push them off another year, so when I was at my appointment my doctor was able to start the process for me to schedule them. For example, my last liver MRI was supposed to be last year, but I was told to wait on it due to the pandemic. So hopefully when I do it this year, this will be the last one I need. But because it’s been almost 2 years since my last one, I needed a new order to get scheduled for the MRI. Normally, I call my liver surgeon so he can order it, but my doctor was able to put in the order for me so I could save that time. I still need to schedule it, but I’ll probably have it in the next month or two. It just depends on the time options. I also got an order for my next mammogram, which was something else I skipped last year. I don’t have to do regular ones just yet, but it’s good for me to do them.
Also, since my last regular appointment, I had my appointment with the geneticist so I could get breast MRIs covered by my insurance as a cancer screening. The geneticist said that I didn’t need to start doing those MRIs just yet, but I wanted to confirm that with my doctor. And she agrees, so I have a few more years before those MRIs are regular screenings for me.
And the last thing I set up were some regular blood tests that I haven’t done in a few years. This wasn’t just skipped because of the pandemic, but because I don’t always do them regularly. But they are all just boring things like blood sugar, liver enzymes (which I know were really off before, but it was because of my tumor), cholesterol, and things like that. I probably should be better about checking these things regularly and I need to see how often I really should do them.
Considering that I missed last year’s annual appointment and a few other doctor appointments that I usually would have, I think this appointment went really smoothly. Obviously, I don’t have test results from any tests I did yet, but there’s nothing I’m worried about and nothing my doctor was worried about. Honestly, the most worrisome thing during my appointment was the burst blood vessel in my eye. I know it still looks pretty bad, but as soon as my doctor walked into the room I reassured her that I was safe at home and nothing bad had happened to me. And she’s known me for years, so she knew I was ok and didn’t have to question me too much about it. And I think we both had a good laugh over the fact that I have had a few different suspicious-looking injuries that could look bad but they are actually from something innocent.
Hopefully, I can get the rest of my regular appointments in soon. I have almost all of them scheduled, but if things get really bad again with the pandemic I might have to put them off. But I’m hoping this appointment this week was me kicking off getting back on track with staying on top of my health.
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