“Back aches: methods that work” Le Point magazine, May 27, 2010
One of my best friends has suffered from severe back problems for years. Even when she learned that she had two slipped discs that would require physical therapy and meticulous attention to her movements for the rest of her life, I couldn’t quite empathize with her pain. Since my teens, I’ve had recurring problems with my neck; muscle spasms that would leave me virtually paralyzed and screaming in pain but with medicine I was back to normal very quickly. Certainly not like the kind of back pain that my friend goes through in waves.
That is, until recently. At the end of October I started experiencing piercing lower back pain which I immediately attributed to too much sitting in front of a computer (and perhaps improper posture). What began as something I thought would pass with a day or two of ibuprofen turned into two weeks of hell – a pinched nerve that sent pain through both legs, making sitting, standing, sleeping and being absolutely impossible. Foolishly, I didn’t go see a doctor to get it sorted out at the beginning and let it calm down and pass on its own. I was back to normal but still fearful that the pain would return. After months went by without any flare-ups, I thought I was in the clear.
Then several weeks ago I came down with a cold which manifested itself primarily with a whopper of a cough. You know, one of those hacking, full-bodied coughs that lingers all day and leads to embarrassment in public transportation when you know people are staring at you with disgust because they’re afraid of catching your plague. A week after this began, my back started to hurt again but this time it worsened quickly. Having learned my lesson from the first time around, I immediately went to see an osteopath. After discussing what happened, the doctor told me to remove everything but my underwear. Taken aback, I immediately thought, should I make a run for it? But then I remembered, I’m in France. There’s no room to be prudish. I should have expected it since it’s even worse at the gynecologist where they have a tendency to maintain full conversations while you nervously undress. There’s certainly no knocking at the door to make sure you’re decent or even a paper gown to cover up. I’ll give this guy one thing, he had enough decency not to watch me.
After an uncomfortable 30 seconds, he proceeded to look at my spine, had me bend over until I cried out in pain, and proceeded to manipulate my back and my lower abdominal muscles to determine what was going on. After two sessions of contorting and stretching and putting me into oddly soothing yet awkward positions, he concluded that I had a weakness in the disc between my last two vertebrae and was to take anti-inflammatories until it passed. I left feeling reassured and confident I’d be pain-free in a few days.
I probably should have rested more than I did. The Sunday following my last osteopath appointment, I woke up in the middle of the night to a strange sound in the apartment and sat up abruptly in bed. (Okay, it was the sound of my cat starting to vomit and I wanted to make sure it wasn’t on the furniture. If you have a cat, you know the sound). The sudden movement caused throbbing twinges throughout the lower half of my body to the point where twisting ever so slightly felt like torture.
There was no way I’d get through the night. In hysterics which reminded of me of much of my childhood (my parents must have fond memories), I told Mr. Cheese (as one of my readers calls him) that we needed to call SOS médecins, emergency doctors that make house calls. We called the service at 1:15am and the doctor arrived at 2am with a comprehensive toolkit of sorts. At any given time, SOS docs carry stethoscopes, EKG equipment, pain medication among other apparatuses.
In 1966, when Doctor Marcel Lascar arrived at work on a Monday after a long weekend, he learned that one of his heart patients had died over the weekend because he was unable to reach a physician. If repairmen could come fix a home emergency on weekends, why couldn’t doctors? And from there, the SOS médecins service was formed. Today it is a network of approximately 1,000 doctors who respond to emergency calls varying from relatively minor to life-threatening. The visit greatly exceeds the cost of a normal doctor’s visit but most if not all of it is reimbursed by French social security. People may complain of high taxes in France but it’s social services like these that emphasize America’s broken and corrupt healthcare system that makes a mockery of human life. National solidarity is not even in the American vocabulary.
All that said, the doc gave me some pain medication to help me make it through the night, left me with a prescription for anti-inflammatories and a valium derivative to relax my muscles in the evening and an arrêt de travail, a medical leave from work. I got myself a prescription for an xray when I started having trouble walking. The pain was running down my right leg and caused me to limp like a granny.
The bones looked normal on the xray, so it was off to my primary care doctor to explain the whole story and ask for a cat scan or MRI. Another arrêt de travail later and an insufferable wait at the radiology center, I had a scan that confirmed that I was dealing with a slightly herniated disc and a pinched sciatic nerve. The remedy? Rest, anti-inflammatories and eventually physical therapy. In other words, suck it up and limp until the pain miraculously disappears.
Despite the fact that we are now going on 3 weeks of discomfort, I’ve learned several things out of all this (most importantly, #4)
1) I better get used to parading around doctor’s offices in my undies if I’m going to live in France.
2) Despite the incompetent and obnoxious secretary and the hospital restroom with blood on the floor (I kid you not), I waited all of 5 minutes for my Xray and will be reimbursed entirely.
3) Living on the 5th floor without an elevator is great when you’re physically able to go up and down the stairs. Let’s hope neither of us break a leg.
4) SOS Médecins have a bad reputation. After telling my story to a few friends, they all sounded surprised by how satisfied I was with the service and explained that they are known for misdiagnosing and inappropriately prescribing treatment. Seeing your primary care physician is imperative if you’ve used their services and often, your doctor will end up modifying what was prescribed. Good to know for the future.
Yes, taxes in France are steep but a great deal of the money is put toward systems that allow for a better quality of life. We pay the healthcare for those most in need of medical attention and damn glad we did when it’s us that needs help. When my mom recounts her battles with her insurance company and her ever-increasing premium, I can’t think of even one reason why I’d want to live in a system where profit trumps human life.
NOTE: Check out this video report by David Turecamo for CBS that looks at the pros and cons of the French healthcare system, a more honest analysis than Michael Moore’s depiction in “Sicko”.
