Before dealing with a specialist doctor, we strongly recommend, (and do it ourselves,) that you send them a letter by email along these lines – “I am, (sex, age and other personal details;) I have this or these problems, (blah, blah blah;) is helping people with these problems within your areas of expertise?; if not, is there anyone else you can recommend?; looking forward to hearing from you; yours etc. etc.”
One of our readers reports that after he’d had a certain test, his GP told him that it had disclosed something which he described as a “life and death matter,” and gave him the names of two specialists he could refer him to for help in dealing with it.
Before seeing them, our reader says that he sent them both one of the letters we’ve described above, AND,
Specialist 1 replied saying that helping people with this problem was not within her areas of expertise.
Specialist 2 replied that it wasn’t a “life and death matter” at all and not to worry about it.
To us, it’s madness to consider dealing with a medical specialist if you haven’t got it in writing from him or her directly, or someone writing on their behalf, that the area in which you need help is within their areas of expertise – even if a GP has suggested that they may be an appropriate person to see. You only have yourself to blame if you find that you’ve wasted your time and money by seeing someone who doesn’t even claim to have the expertise necessary to be able to help you.
