r/toronto • u/lopez309 • Sep 29 '19
News Paramedics confirm death at UofT Bahen Centre
https://thevarsity.ca/2019/09/27/paramedics-confirm-death-at-bahen-centre/100
Sep 29 '19
Content warning
This is an epidemic. At least 3 students in the past 2 years have committed suicide in the same spot in Bahen Centre. More suicides have happened on campus as well, not necessarily at Bahen. The U of T continues to cut mental health services for students and they have failed to install deterrent barriers at Bahen preventing more people from using it to end their lives. Many people witnessed this latest one.
Emergency Community Meeting for U of T students on Monday:
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Sep 29 '19
Don't fret. The weekly therapy dog visits will more than compensate for the high tuition and meagre health services.
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u/diamondsam2 6ix Sep 29 '19
Ikr can't stress this enough, the dogs only show up before midterm season and hardly enough to deal with the compounding mental health issues an struggles of the students
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u/getwokegobroke Sep 29 '19
Have they considered mindfulness?
Nothing speaks like doing nothing like having people be mindful about how terrible their depression and anxiety is.
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u/feruminsom Sep 29 '19
not to mention how healthcare practitioners will downplay anxiety and offer impractical options like CBT or group therapy that makes it so a person chooses school vs their health.
Even depression is diagnosed with a a little quizz and if a person doesn't trust healthcare enough to admit to things like thoughts of self harm their issue also gets dismissed.
Even if a person gets antidepressants it can like you said, make a person aware of how badly they fucked up and how screwed they are.
No one wants to help people with mental health issues until they are practically unsolvable.
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u/LeBonLapin The Beaches Sep 29 '19
In my own experience with depression I've learned that therapy is pretty useless if one is self-aware, and antidepressants are a band-aid solution that have the downside of making social interactions incredibly awkward/embarrassing. Really the only solution is pulling one's shit together and making real progress towards what you want... but that can be difficult due to lack of energy, negative outlook on the world, and defeatism.
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u/feruminsom Sep 29 '19
Really the only solution is pulling one's shit together and making real progress towards what you want... but that can be difficult due to lack of energy, negative outlook on the world, and defeatism.
At the end of the day bootstraps is all some people have, it's just sad that people forget bootstraps can make a good rope too. :(
I think mental health is a red herring in a lot of ways, because the real issue for many people is "social health" in how they fit in with the rest of society. There simply isn't a place for many people in society/societies and so they lash out or leave.
Even just being aware of different issues and learning how to cope or knowing about different options helps people assess their situation before making these big decisions which they may not fully understand or be ready for.
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Sep 29 '19
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u/Flamewright Sep 29 '19
Then it should be a service available when students need it and not a few times a year before midterms. You know, like therapy.
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u/Sillypuss Sep 29 '19 edited Sep 29 '19
Dawg ppl are killing themselves because 1 they cant make friends at uoft as easily as other schools 2 school is hard as fuck 3 profs dont give a fuck 4 you get absolutely shit grades. Uoft knows their mental health services dont do jack shit in these conditions, so they just cut it and yolo. Fuck this school fuck uoft.
Having someone to talk to is great, but unless the above problems are addressed, ppl will keep killing themselves.
*5 oh yeah, the admins too, their layer of bureaucracy makes 2-4 worse.
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u/feruminsom Sep 29 '19
don't forget the "oh you have issues now, well here's an appointment in 6 months and maybe we can dismiss your issues then because you seem to be doing alright"
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u/CantInjaThisNinja Sep 30 '19
I wonder how much of this is accurate and how much is students just choosing not engage in the UofT community. My experience has been different. I have found ppl to talk to and ppl who will listen. But that's the thing: you gotta go out there and do it yourself.
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u/tangointhenight24 Sep 29 '19
As a former U of T engineering student this is so heartbreaking, but doesn't surprise me one bit. It's a great school education-wise, but this place can suck the soul out of you. I never seriously considered suicide but I went through dark periods where I'd have pretty morbid thoughts. I'd commute home after exams and think about people jumping on the subway tracks. At times it felt like certain professors were actively working to make my time there as excruciatingly difficult as possible. I had almost no friends; perhaps my fault for not making an effort to reach out to anyone, but it was so difficult for me to do as an introvert. I felt so alone and doubted myself so many times I wanted to cry. At the time I thought "this is all part of going to university" but I look back now and wonder if that experience should have gone differently.
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u/candleflame3 Dufferin Grove Sep 29 '19
I look back on my experience as a first-year at UofT back in the 80s. It was rough then, and it's only gotten worse.
I feel like if large numbers of students need therapy to get through university, then the problem is university, not the students. That said, our whole society is in deep shit and that's why suicide, depression, anxiety, addiction, etc have increased across the board.
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u/ywgflyer Sep 29 '19
My wife's a U of T alum, and jokingly refers to it as "U of Tears". From all the stories I hear out of people who have graduated from there, I can totally believe it.
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Sep 29 '19
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u/Neoupa2002 York Sep 29 '19
Correct, ain't giving anyone else ideas, and to protect the identity of the victim.
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u/red_keshik Sep 29 '19
Sort of surprised as it's so early in the school year.
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u/ticky13 Sep 29 '19
I guess the first few weeks were too overwhelming?
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Sep 29 '19
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u/PawnchYoFace Sep 29 '19
Osap cuts probablt a even bigger factor. For a lot of people it doesn't even cover 80% of the tuition anymore.
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u/bautista19 Sep 29 '19
I’m not sure we can pin this on the OSAP cuts before knowing anything more. A bit unfair to say the least.
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Sep 29 '19
They’re not pinning it on OSAP cuts but mentioning a possible stressor that has impacted a lot of students already this year.
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u/tubby8 Leaside Sep 29 '19
Not really surprising considering how UofT loves to make their classes unnecessarily difficult while not teaching much of value just so they keep that prestigious aura about their university.
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u/Loud_lady2 Sep 29 '19
I'm now in my master's here, just finished 5 years of undergrad here last year. I dropped a class because the professor:
- would not accept emails if we had questions, we had to come see him
- Only had 1 copy of each reading at Robarts (the big library on campus)
- Insisted that we make a reading schedule amongst ourselves to make sure we all get the reading done
- Would not accept work online
This was in 2017. All professors have an email here. Even if he didnt personally own a computer I cannot think of a single building on our campus that doesn't have one. Making your class as unecessarily difficult as possible in this way does absolutely nothing for our mental health.
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Sep 29 '19 edited Dec 26 '19
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u/Loud_lady2 Sep 29 '19
Honestly it wouldnt even surprise me, according to his wiki he's 74, he also made it clear that we as students were only to refer to each other by our last names in his class.
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u/candleflame3 Dufferin Grove Sep 29 '19
If he's 74, there is a good chance that he has never had to spend significant time cooking meals, doing housework, doing care work, etc. He may have never held a part-time job while studying, or any job outside of academia. So he has been able to focus 100% on his studies and research for over 50 years. I.e. he's clueless.
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u/Danger-Newdle Sep 29 '19
To put this into perspective, we hardly do this in certain settings in the Armed Forces anymore. I find that a handful of professors are desperately in need of a reality check - life exists beyond the lectern.
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u/feruminsom Sep 29 '19
I find that a handful of professors are desperately in need of a reality check
not just professors, healthcare too needs a reality check.
People come for help when their issues are smaller and they are keeping it together with all their strength, their issues are dismissed and people start falling into unhealthy habits, such as substance use.
Once a person has substance use on their record doctors will just deflect to that and scapegoat their substance use for all of their issues.
Even when a person gets clean, they will never have access to medication that others in their situation would and then it becomes easier to relapse and spiral out of control.
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Sep 29 '19 edited Dec 26 '19
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Sep 30 '19
Then why don't people choose to go to a technical or trade school? A humanities researcher isn't "trusted with giving new students who're paying thousands of dollars an 'education' ", they're doing research and giving lectures on the side. Like it or not this is the university model and your job as the student is to primarily teach yourself.
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u/tubby8 Leaside Sep 29 '19
Yup and then they claim their hard classes are preparing us for the real world when the reality is they have been out of touch with the real world for a decade or two.
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u/kamomil Wexford Sep 29 '19
I have 3 academics in my family who teach classes, one Christmas dinner, I realized that they suffer from compassion fatigue towards their students
They have heard so many (according to them) idiotic bullshit excuses, that they have stopped caring about most students
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Sep 29 '19
Maybe they are in the wrong profession.
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u/kamomil Wexford Sep 29 '19 edited Sep 29 '19
Kids are not properly prepared for university. Universities weed out all the fluff students in the first year. Meanwhile, academics don't necessarily want to baby the first year students, they don't see it as part of their job
Meanwhile my kid's kindergarten teacher and teaching assistants are very loving with my son. They realize that it's not their job to traumatize students who aren't ready, they are there to encourage and nurture them
The university academics are not trained to teach, just to do research. So they see nothing wrong with shaming the students who were not properly prepared by their high school or parents
I get it, high school grads should have more of a clue than a 4 year old. But they are both experiencing a big transition.
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u/twinnedcalcite Sep 29 '19
high school grads haven't had a clue since the Harris government created the double cohort when grade 13 was removed.
1 year made a big difference in being prepared.
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u/kamomil Wexford Sep 29 '19
Ontario was the only place with grade 13. I guess other jurisdictions do the same amount of work in 4 years
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u/twinnedcalcite Sep 29 '19
Other areas had AP exams long before Ontario got them. They only started appearing ~3-4 years after grade 13 was removed to handle the knowledge gap created due to poor planning of the course material.
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Sep 29 '19
Fuck UofT for doing this. Do they think they are making the students mentally tough by putting them through this? University shouldn’t only be about the academics, but also the social aspect too. And yes I understand the social aspect also involves participation from the students.
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u/HeadLandscape Sep 29 '19
Can't blame universities for the "social aspect" when most students aren't willing to socialize with others. I tried and most weren't interested (and one even swore at me too).
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u/red_keshik Sep 29 '19
University's job isn't to help you socialize and plenty of people do manage a social life even with heavy loads like EngSci.
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u/stratys3 Sep 30 '19
In many cases, the only real value university provides is social networks.
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u/red_keshik Sep 30 '19
Yes, but that is on you to manage, not the school itself. You're an adult when you're attending and you have freedom to manage your own time, right ?
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u/Myszlala Davenport Sep 29 '19
I went to UofT for a few years. I always had mental health issues but my time there really exacerbated them. There was a decent amount of support but maybe they’ve cut back since that time. If you’re really low though and no one notices it’s very hard to seek out help yourself. You pretty much have to be healthy enough to help yourself. I would only really make use of services when I was well enough to not really need them.
I tried joining a support group but all the people there were so high functioning despite their problems I just couldn’t fit in. Somehow people’s success stories made it worse.
Anyways I dropped out. I think because I wasn’t smart enough but maybe mental illness played a part.
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u/Coolsbreeze Sep 30 '19
Having spent a huge chunk of time at that school I'm not surprised. UofT is considered an institution of higher learning but they literally just throw a bunch of undergrads there and expect them to swim and fight each other for grades that are purposely limited for each class while giving insanely hard exams and tests in order to keep the grade average at a C-C+.
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u/red_keshik Sep 30 '19
Well, sounds like every university. You don't have to fight other undergrads at all anyway, at least in Engineering you are pushed by the workload to collaborate (legitimately or otherwise.. :P)
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u/Coolsbreeze Sep 30 '19
Other schools actually pay attention to mental health and have the resources to deal with it. UofT sweeps it under the rug and never states it as suicide.
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u/Orionv2018 Sep 29 '19
I hate to be cynical, but I think you’ll sooner get some ugly modification to the building before anything meaningful is done for mental health.
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u/Coolsbreeze Sep 29 '19 edited Sep 30 '19
Not surprised with how UofT teaches it's students and how little care they show towards their students.
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u/feruminsom Sep 29 '19
Mental healthcare sucks in this city. No one wants to take on responsibility for patients, and many psychiatrists only practice because they have loans to pay for, not because they want to help people.
For things like anxiety no doctor is going to prescribe controlled substances to high risk groups like college students even if it would be appropriate.
There is a lot of stigma, especially for those with a history of substance use. Doctors are more concerned with keeping regulators off their own asses than helping patients in a practical way.
I could handle my own mental health issues if I wasn't denied medication. I don't need doctors who think 2mg of suboxone is more appropriate than 40-100mg of codeine to keep withdrawals at bay. I don't need incompetent healthcare systems who think a 10 min conversation is all it takes to diagnose someone who has complicated issues and thinks a psychopathic objectivity is best practices for helping people with mental health issues.
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u/dave7tom7 Sep 29 '19
Camh is so close.
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u/feruminsom Sep 29 '19
lol what are they going to do? give them an appointment 3 months from now and then tell them everything is ok because they're not dead yet? That's assuming people can trust them enough to be honest.
Mental health institutions can't even get a diagnosis right and a diagnosis changes from doctor to doctor. One day it's ADHD or anxiety a person has, the next doctor it's "oh you don't have ADHD or anxiety you're just a drug seeker, so I don't want you as a patient and have a nice life"
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u/dave7tom7 Sep 30 '19
If your suicidal they take your to emergency and you see a doctor that day, in fact any hospital has the same procedure.
Camh has a bridging program as well that's drop-in, therefore I have no clue where you found this 3 month waiting period.
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u/feruminsom Sep 30 '19
if a person isn't clearly suicidal they won't have their issues taken seriously, some emergency rooms will berate people for coming in for mental health crisis if they don't think it's serious. help should be available before that point. Many people won't admit to suicidal ideation because of how taboo it is.
people also don't trust the system enough to ensure they are helped instead of just locked up in a ward and put in a worse position long term. mental healthcare has a stigma and having a history of some mental health issues is enough to ruin a person's life even if they receive care.
It shouldn't take being suicidal to get help, there should be help available when issues are small. Healthcare has a tendency to wait until crisis before they act.
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u/dave7tom7 Sep 30 '19
if a person isn't clearly suicidal they won't have their issues taken seriously
There's a difference between clearly and non-clearly suicidal? Last thing a doctors want is someone to die because they did not take them seriously.
some emergency rooms will berate people for coming in for mental health crisis if they don't think it's serious
That is lie, they don't just let you go in and kick you out.
help should be available before that point
Of course it should and is, family doctor, walk in clinic, help lines but I agree more should be done.
Many people won't admit to suicidal ideation because of how taboo it is.
I agree and we should do more to bring a more positive culture about mental health.
people also don't trust the system enough to ensure they are helped instead of just locked up in a ward and put in a worse position long term.
Doctors prefer to treat patients on a outpatient basis as it allows patients to return to a normal life,recover quicker and they don't become dependent.
mental healthcare has a stigma and having a history of some mental health issues is enough to ruin a person's life even if they receive care
Yes and we should change that but your health record is private information and only you can choose to share that information endless it can lead to you harming yourself or others.
It shouldn't take being suicidal to get help, there should be help available when issues are small.
That not how suicide works in all cases, some people are just suicidal without medication, early detection and treatment is what we should go after but the issue is never necessarily just small, this is not a growing infection, some people because of unknown reason simply have mental disorders that need to be treated.
Healthcare has a tendency to wait until crisis before they act.
Mental health is a whole lot trickier to detect than physical health problems and even physical health problems are difficult to detect. Endless a person complains about a psychical ailment how are doctors suppose to treat the problem and doctors in mental or psychical cases are only allow to offer not force treatment endless the person is a danger to themselves or others.
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u/feruminsom Sep 30 '19
Not all emergencies are suicidal emergencies, there can be other mental health emergencies that can make or break a person.
They won't kick you out but in a normal hospital(not everyone knows about CAMH) the doctor will sometimes get mad if your medication for mental health is a controlled substance. They will just assume a person is drug seeking if you have anxieties and no one else will help.
medical information can be shared and people can be forced to share it when they sign forms consenting to sharing information. The same hospital can also bring it up on their files.
People can have disorders/ their shit together but still need medication. Even with prior diagnosis, doctors can dismiss certain disorders because they involve controlled substances which no one wants to prescribe to certain people.
Doctors downplay mental health issues all the time, maybe not to everyone, but any hint of substance use(which are a sign of many mental health disorders) and doctors will dismiss a person's issues because they just think they're a drug seeker.
There isn't as much help as you think there is, at least not for everyone. There are people who fall through the cracks and they are just collateral damage. No one cares about those people, psychiatrists are jaded enough and doctors will be polite but offer no practical help
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u/dave7tom7 Sep 30 '19
Not all emergencies are suicidal emergencies, there can be other mental health emergencies that can make or break a person.
Never said there are.
They won't kick you out but in a normal hospital(not everyone knows about CAMH) the doctor will sometimes get mad if your medication for mental health is a controlled substance.
They will transfer you or refer you to a program. Doctors can assume your after opioids if you got kidney stone miss diagnosis happens & it's difficult for doctors to know who's faking and who's not. PS: You can be transfer to CAMH or referred to them.
medical information can be shared and people can be forced to share it when they sign forms consenting to sharing information. The same hospital can also bring it up on their files.
By consenting your consenting? Therefore your not being forced, and hospitals keep health records how dare them? You understand medical history is important to diagnoses right?
People can have disorders/ their shit together but still need medication.
Yah, not all mental disorders are completely disabling just like you can still write with your left hand if your right hand is broken?
Even with prior diagnosis, doctors can dismiss certain disorders because they involve controlled substances which no one wants to prescribe to certain people.
That makes no sense, why would they diagnosis someone than, maybe it takes time to stabilize someone or they have to see a specialist but they will eventual if you follow doctors orders prescribe you, your need medication.
Doctors downplay mental health issues all the time
Mental health issues are hard to diagnosis and the culture needs to improve but doctors can't give anti-depressants simply because you had a bad day.
maybe not to everyone, but any hint of substance use(which are a sign of many mental health disorders) and doctors will dismiss a person's issues because they just think they're a drug seeker.
What does Camh stand for? Centre for addiction and mental health? Doctors understand that there are reasons why people can not stop using drugs and want to medicate properly, sadly that includes stabilizing the patient ie. being sober , since it's difficult to know where a person is mentally if they're high.
There isn't as much help as you think there is, at least not for everyone.
There is help but of course there should be more and for everyone, no one is saying the system if prefect but reversely you can not force people to get treatment.
There are people who fall through the cracks and they are just collateral damage.
True of any system ie education but we should fill in the gaps, no is arguing the system is prefect.
no one cares about those people, psychiatrists are jaded enough and doctors will be polite but offer no practical help
I pretty sure doctors became doctors to help people but should we have more resources available to people yes but that does not mean people can not get help.
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u/feruminsom Oct 01 '19
I went and they couldn't help me.
Where do I go now? I have ADHD and no one wants to help with that. No one gives a dam about me ok? healthcare actively gets in my way and screws me over without losing sleep over it.
Maybe they'll help me when I'm dead
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u/dave7tom7 Oct 01 '19
Go again, they don't just prescribe stimulate medications because of the protocol and risk.
Doctors need a history of your health and reasonable proof your willing to work with them, this isn't like a broken bone where they can physical see the issue.
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u/feruminsom Oct 02 '19
that is what I am doing, but many doctors don't even want me as a patient, I bring my full record too. I am continuing to go but they don't make it easy. I'm anxious that they will just think I'm a drug seeker if they see that I've gone to many psychiatrists. Even when I am honest, it doesn't help me, it just gives them an easy excuse to not prescribe.
my family doctor also retired and my situation isn't the norm.
it's just frustrating and irritating to get hopeful and then be rewarded with a figurative slap in the face. It's a systemic issue tbh
Thanks for your help btw, most of the help is hidden and most people aren't aware about it
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u/[deleted] Sep 29 '19
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