Neil Macdonald, of all people;
It has been six years since doctors first accurately diagnosed what was making it so painfully difficult for Bagyan to urinate. What they’d thought was an enlarged prostate was in fact a buildup of scar tissue blocking his urethra.
For the first few years, his urologist repeatedly tried to clear it out, inserting catheters and scopes and even a scope with miniature scissors into his penis, working up to his bladder. Each time, the scar tissue would just thicken.
“He was making it worse,” says Bagyan, in the deliberate, fatigued cadence of someone for whom pain and discomfort never abates.
He needed surgery. But only a few surgeons in Canada had the training necessary to operate.
So patient Bill Bagyan entered the twilight world of the Canadian waiting list – a place of voicemails and messages and sitting on hold for an hour at a time.
[…]
Finally, in the spring of 2016, he was told that his name had somehow been misplaced, that he was not in fact on the waiting list, but that it had been corrected and he’d hear back by Christmas. Or maybe by early 2017.
A year later, in April of 2017, he contacted the Ottawa Hospital’s patient relations staff. When they got back to him a few weeks later, it was to tell him that unfortunately, he’d been misplaced again.
