@stuuke how is your tinnitus these days? I travel to Dr. Hepworth 3/12 to see his NP and 3/14 to see him for a surgical consult. I saw yours wasn’t so good after your styloidectomy and have read through your case until now. I’m so sorry for your frustrations with his office. I feel the same.
Unfortunately I still have all of the symptoms I had before my surgery. I have regular tinnitus and not the pulsing kind. It seems to be worse in the evenings. It’s annoying but I probably wouldn’t put it in my top 5 symptoms.
There are plenty of people that swear by Dr. Hepworth so hopefully he is able to help you. As frustrated as I’ve been I’ve never treated them in a negative way so I don’t know why they continue to disregard my case.
I’m so sorry to hear this @stuuke . I will ask them about how to get a call back when I’m there. It’s never fun when things don’t resolve or get worse. I know we all need hope and some relief. I will continue to pray for all of us. Thank you for getting back to me so quickly. Stay strong.
Heather
Still no word from Dr. Hepworth’s office on my Dec/Jan imaging. I still don’t have his feedback on the procedure Dr. Fargen I did in August of last year. When I had my telehealth appointment with Dr. Hepworth he said they didn’t have the notes but I’ve confirmed with Dr. Fargen that they were sent and they’ve sent them multiple times. Dr. Fargen typically gets back to me within hours and communicates directly.
At this point, I would call Dr. Hepworth’s ofc & ask to speak to the office manager. I don’t know how helpful she’ll be but at least you’d be talking to someone closer to the “top”. Perhaps she has no idea that all this lack of communication is going on, & if she does & isn’t working to correct it, that’s even more appalling!! Sorry I didn’t get her name but I did see her face when I was there.
Still trying to reach them. I called and left messages for the front desk and nurses line. I’ve also messaged through the portal.
If we had a thumbs down option , I’d click it for your post. I did hear that Dr. Hepworth was out of the office for a week starting sometime last week so perhaps that’s why your response is delayed. Not making excuses, just providing information.
Still no word back from Dr. Hepworth’s office. I’ve now left messages at this front desk, nurse’s line, emailed him directly, sent messages through the portal and even had kind forum members ask for his staff to contact me during their visits all with no response. I’ve never been rude or critical when I’ve spoken them despite my frustrations so I don’t know why they’re ghosting me. I know others have had issues but many more have been helped by Dr. Hepworth so I still wouldn’t discourage new patients from seeking his help. I just don’t get it. At this point I’m moving forward with trying botox with Dr. Cha and will start reaching out to other doctors to address my styloids and C1 shaving.
Also just want to say thanks again to the members of the forum that have helped me along the way through messages, advocating for me with doctors and viewing my scans. This condition is something none of my friends or families understand and when doctors aren’t helping there’s definitely a strong feeling of hopelessness.
Please continue to post here as you want/need to @stuuke. You’ve been a part of our ES “family” for a long time now so please let us continue to support you as you need it.
I hope whomever you see for your styloid/C-1 care going forward is promptly helpful & the antithesis of your experience w/ Dr. Hepworth’s office.
Still not a word from Dr. Hepworth. I requested a referral from Dr. Fargen for Dr. Cha but haven’t heard back from that either. I’m starting to feel like Bruce Willis in The 6th Sense.
that’s not good & incredibly frustrating for you
As my surgery approaches I’m reading a little more on our page here, and caught up on your journey from where i last left off (you had just gotten your ct results and were thinking Botox and waiting to hear from Hepworth… at the early stages. I just want to say that my heart goes out to you. We hear it far too often that patients struggling can’t get through to him. I feel like there is a sinkhole where things just disappear. I honestly can’t believe that he even knows that this is happening. As if his staff just doesn’t tell him. I can’t understand how his office continues to be run like this. I am so sorry for your experience. I can’t imagine, and hope I’ll never have to know, how that must feel. I am really glad that you are an existing patient of Fargen, he may take a minute to get back to you but he will. I hope that the Botox makes a difference for you and if needed Fargen can certainly advice you where to go next. Hui is wonderful and could be a terrific resource for you as I know you already know… and Constantino of course. I read on a page dedicated to Fargen that there is another surgeon in WS who is getting really good reviews and doing this work as well (not Hackman, but one who treats the vascular elements). And I wonder if Fargen himself may be able to help you directly as he is now also performing jugular decompression/styloidectomy surgeries in addition to stenting…? And there is always the last ditch of getting a shunt if it’s causing IIH, You may already know all of this, but in case one of them is new, I wanted to send this your way.
Sorry for being lame, @akc, but where is WS? Did you mean WA & if so, it that state or DC?
Winston Salem, NC
What vdm said
I popped over to the Fargen page and asked who that other surgeon was in Winston Salem, NC and it is Dr Sullivan. Dr Fargen refers complex patients (where it’s a less straight forward version of vascular compression) to Dr Hepworth and Dr Sullivan. @Jules @Isaiah_40_31 I quickly googled in case you want to add him to the list:
Christopher A. Sullivan, MD | Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist (wakehealth.edu)
Thank you for that!
@Jules added him to the Doctors List with the information you gave us. It’ll be great to have another doctor who does IJV compression to whom to refer our members.
Waiting for Dr. Hepworth in the Telehealth lobby and hoping he shows up. 6 months and not a word back from his office despite emails, portal messages, phone calls and the help of some kind people on this forum talking directly to Dr. Hepworth.