59 Yoa Female in Need of Tatoo Removal - San Diego, CA

Pico-sure laser removal had been recommended because of the color intense tattoo wanted removed. Tattoo was in the inside forearm of my dominant hand. 1. Attempted to discuss pain management prior to the procedure and the Dr. carelessly chuckled "Of all the questions I've been asked, none has been about pain." I was intimidated and passively accepted his answer. 2. Medical Assistant is unaware that all doctors at the clinic are Medical Doctors. Medical Assistant was very condescending whilst telling me this. She called the evening of the procedure and I asked her to contact the Dr. for a pain prescription and she told me the clinic did not write prescriptions because the Drs. are Cosmetic Dermatologists and not Medical Drs. 3. Discharge instructions state to call the Doctor if there are any problems after-care. I called the doctor twice and he did not return either call. First call was returned by an irate and extremely rude Medical Assistant who told me she had already given me all my options (See Primary Care Or go to ER - this on Christmas weekend). Medical Assistant also said she would coordinate my paunchier with my Primary Care Providers. Medical Assistant obviously unaware of the Health Information Portability and Accounting Act of 1996 (HIPAA). There is no way I would ever sign a HIPAA release to someone who seemed so ill-educated. At this point, I allowed the call to end since it was obviously not yielding any favorable results. 4. Second call was returned by the Clinic Manager. I advised her I wanted to discuss my pain management with the Dr. and told her specifically what type of pain relief I wanted (Same as prescribed in ER but more to cover the 7 day scorching spree). The Clinic Manager (very professional, by the way) called me back and said the Dr. would discuss pain management at my next appointment. Problem with that is, clinic has a 7 day cancellation notice or pay full fee for appointment ($550.00). I did not want to come in for the second appointment to be told that I would spend another week in searing pain with no pain medication. I cancelled my appointment immediately. As it turned out, because there were three large gouges in my arm from the first appointment, I was not healed well enough by the time my second appointment would have been (4 weeks from the first one.) 5. Pre checklist needs to include removal of all jewelry on or near the site of tattoo removal. I ended up in the ER with pain at a level of 8.5 on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being fully engulfed in flames. The first thing the ER Dr. told me was to remove my rings. In my angst of fiery pain, I did not notice that there was swelling on my forearm and that swelling had spread to my hand and fingers (at that time, tinged slightly purple). I very nearly was unable to remove my rings. Had my rings remained in place, there very well may have been functional damage on two fingers of my dominant hand. 6. Post checklist for Medical Assistants needs to have the 'contact patient' portion removed since Medical Assistants do not know what to do if someone says anything other than "I'm fine. When one is in searing pain, one does not want to talk to someone who cannot and will not do anything to resolve the situation. Additionally, anyone in this level of pain does not want to be spoken to in a condescending manner by someone who speaks as though they are under-educated. 7. Contacting patients in the evening needs to be added the the DOCTORS' duties since if there are any problems, he/she has the license and knowledge to do what needs to be done. 8. Clinic needs to retrain Medical Assistants particularly in HIPAA, implement changes suggested in this post and go over all procedures to make certain they are complete and serve a purpose. Otherwise, hubris and lack of sincere caring will be the ultimate demise of this clinic, if not, the basis for a Negligent Injury Lawsuit. 9. Receptionists, Records Clerk, and Clinic Manager are highly proficient and professional. Medical Assistant speaks as though she is not only ill-educated as a High School Graduate, but also ill-educated in the Medical Assistant field. The Doctor's treatment of me leads me to believe he is an over-educated [RS bleep]. For your safety, pick any other doctor or clinic.

I did some research on the internet and found another tattoo laser removal place that uses pico sure. Absolute Laster Tattoo Removal on Convoy Street in San Diego (858-737-4555) is awesome. Half the price of the place I initially went to and much more professional. They looked at the medical records I had gotten a copy of from that other place and said the reason my arm burned so badly for so long was because the Dr. doing the procedure was going too fast and furious for a tattoo as large and colorful as mine. I had my first treatment yesterday and had some burning later but was able to keep it under control with tylenol and ice packs. This morning it doesn't even hurt. The Nurse even gave me her personal cell phone number should I have any problems. None at all. The tattoo looks much worse than the first time around but the pain level is minimal the morning after. The only thing the other clinic did was inject lidocaine into my arm before the procedure. The new clinic does not do that so the procedure was a bit uncomfortable but tolerable. Absolute Laser Tattoo Removal focuses on pico sure tattoo removal so they are much more in tune with how the laser works and how much one can tolerate in one session - and like I said, at half the price of the other clinic. Also, I did not see anyone at the clinic who looked to be under the age of 25 and all spoke as though they had at minimum, a High School diploma. Will try to post pics later when I get my camera going but like I said - it looks much worse than the first round but looks are definitely deceiving. I feel no pain this morning.