'Rejection'

Dear patient,

It might surprise you to know this, but for many of us doctors, there is a slight tinge of hurt when we are 'rejected'. You know, when you ask to seek a second opinion from someone else. When you choose to not follow our advise and choose to take your case elsewhere.

Certainly, as a consumer and as a person you are entitled to that. I'm sure I'm not the smartest physician out there; perhaps I just did not live up to your expectations. Or perhaps our personalities just didn't match. And though professionally I did what I felt was ethically and scientifically best, there is admittedly still that tinge of disappointment. So, I'm sorry that I could not:

• Prescribe you a treatment for what the internet says is a hormonal disorder when you have 'too much' scrotal skin at the base of your penis
• Write a letter to your landlord medically justifying why you needed to have 4 cats in your apartment to 'look after the diabetes' so that you would not pay the penalty
• Start you on Testosterone replacement despite your total Testosterone levels being 800 ng/dL, because your gym trainer tells you you should be able to lift more weights than what you are doing
• Give you a miracle pill for dramatically lose some of your 350 lbs, when you tell me you don't want to work out
• Tell you why your phallus is shorter than that of your son who is 23 years younger than you

It really gives me no pleasure to disappoint a patient, especially one who was probably given misguided expectations of what an endocrinologist does. And the truth is, there really is a tinge of hurt, when as you check out you ask the receptionist to make an appointment to see one of my colleagues for a 2nd opinion for the above.