To Go or Not To Go

With extra care and attention, I backed into my parking spot like usual. This time, however, I did not get out of my car immediately. Instead, I lowered the back of my seat and put my injured leg up on the dashboard. The pain was still pretty severe then. Plus, I was just very thankful that I could drive home safely. So I took out my insurance card and call the phone number for customer service, trying to figure out to go to an emergency room or not.

The representative was NOT helpful at all in finding out which hospitals were in my exclusive provider network. She was so slow in response and sounded she was unsure of anything she was telling me. After being on the phone with her for almost 25 mins, she gave me a few phone numbers, which turned out to be useless.

So I also called USC's Health Center and Department of Public Safety. Through the automated phone system of the health center, I was able to leave a message for an after-hour nurse, who she called me back in 40 some mins later and told me to go to an emergency room after asking me some questions.

I honestly didn't know whether I should go to an emergency room. Part of me did not want to go because I would have sat there for hours before I get seen by anyone (and plus, I didn't know that my insurance actually would cover 90% for emergency visits). So I called Kenny - a physician assistant friend of mine. So nice and patient he was. He taught me to conduct a test on the phone; sure enough, the result was that I have a ruptured Achilles tendon. He also thought I could wait until the next day to go to USC health center to obtain a referral.

So I stayed home.