Apologies -- this is going to be long and possibly hard to follow.
Background is that DD (7) has a chronic breathing condition which for a long time was suspected to be asthma hospital consultant she is seeing now thinks it is probably not asthma and is running a series of tests to establish what it is. She has now had to have two bronchoscopies cancelled in the past six months. On the first occasion this was due to illness if a child has severe cough/wheeze its difficult to operate on their lungs. Because this had happened recently, when DD got ill a second time within a week of her scheduled operation I proactively got some oral steroids from the GP in order to get her over the worst of it in time to be well enough to go in. It turns out this was a mistake and the op has had to be cancelled again.
I'm sure I've made mistakes here: I knew she had to come off inhaled steroids ahead of the op but was unclear what the position was with oral ones. I also knew she could not have the op if her lungs were in distress through an inflammation caused by a cold. My calculation was that it was better for her lungs to be clear ahead of the op, and that it was better to take the oral steroid, hence the prescription. I panicked a bit, in part because I find it very stressful when DD is ill. I am a single parent and don't have any family support with it when she's ill -- it tends to lead to a lot of sleepless nights for me and it has a knock-on effect on my work so its possible I don't behave all that calmly when its happening.
My problem is that this consultant is, in my view, harsh and very judgemental of me (and incredibly rude). I discovered he had written a letter to my DD's GP after the first op was cancelled, telling the GP I had "ignored medical advice" because I didn't remove her from the inhaled steroid in the run-up to the first op. The reason for this is that I was given just over one week's notice for the op (having been told it would be later in the summer) and DD at the time had a very heavy cold so I didn't want to stop the inhaled steroid cold turkey as I was worried it would prompt a trip to A&E (as has happened).
When I emailed him recently (via his admin) to ask if it was OK to proceed with the second op even though she had taken an oral steroid he replied "I wouldn't normally bother replying, but there is no point doing this op now".
I can see it is extremely frustrating for doctors, not to mention costly for the NHS when operations are needlessly cancelled. The cancellation is due to a combination of bad timing (illness), my making the wrong call and the hospital's failure to give me proper preparation time for this op or enough information about what kind of medication my DD should be taking. On the one hand I was told she could not be on an inhaled steroid, on the other that she would need to have come off this two months before the op. But I was also told the op could not be done if she had a chest infection. It's difficult to make a call on which of these is the most important risk factor. Its hard to get hold of hospital consultants and the GPs and 111 don't provide this sort of information.
I'm really upset about the way he speaks to me. I think its incredible that he has told my GP in a letter that I "ignored medical advice" without bothering to check with me first as to what happened. And that he should feel able to be so rude to me over email when I'm obviously anxious and stressed and I've told him I'm managing the situation on my own.
I know I have made mistakes here and I don't want to alienate him. But I also feel I should not have to be treated like this by someone just because he's a hot shot consultant and I'm a mere thick single mother. I appreciate that doctors like this are unbelievably busy and stressed but I don't think that gives him the right to treat me like this at a stressful point in my life. I am tempted to pick this up with the hospital, but another part of me thinks this is a battle I can't win and the only person who will suffer will be my DD.
Has anyone ever challenged a doctor on behaviour like this? Is it worth it?