Walk-In Clinics... Questionable?

My right-eye has been bothering me for a couple of weeks now. Last week I called up my doctor to make an appointment. His receptionist let me know that he was not accepting anymore patients for the day. I asked her if I could make an appointment for the next day and she said he was going to be out of town until the following week (Tuesday). Fek... I was pretty upset. I told her that I was concirned because I am unable to focus properly out of one eye.

"No acceptions", She says.

I've known my doctor for most of my life, his office is literally across the alley from my house, he has taken care of my family and is close with my dad as well. I know if I told her to tell him my name he would have taken me. That's IF I could have convinced her to tell him. Anyway, I made my appointment for Tuesday (today) and that was that.

Later that day my eye got worse, it wasn't able to focus on anything. It's bad enough that everything becomes blurry, but not bad enough that I can't safely drive. So I left work early and headed on over to a walk-in clinic.

Have you ever questioned how safe it is to sit in a room full of strangers suffering from one ailment or another? Emergency rooms, hospitals, clinics... it's all the same. The worst part is when you have someone hacking their brains out sitting next to you.

After about 1 hr sitting on my butt a room opened up for me. I then had to sit there for another 15 minutes before the doctor came in. She seemed nice enough. I remember being able to hear her while she was talking to the other patients in the other rooms. She's the kind of person who really loves her job and likes to make people feel assured. To be honest... it sometimes felt like she was patronizing me :p

I told her about the discomfort and how my eye was bothering me. I told her that I could feel a lump under my eyelid, she even felt it for herself. Her diagnosis - It's most likely a Stye. The treatment - hot compress, baby shampoo wash, and tobramycin eyedrops (antibiotic). I also let her know that it felt like there was something underneath my eyelid scratching my cornea... still, a sty. Oh yeah, before prescribing the eyedrops to me she tells me, "50% of doctors believe that this works and 50% don't". Nice... so why am I wasting my money on it?

Strange thing... when I reminded her again of my problem focussing she decided to get me to read the eye chart... I got down to the second-last row before having problems. What does that mean? It means that even though I am not able to focus properly my eyesight is almost 20/20... wtf.

So here I am almost a week later. The eyedrops and the rest haven't made much difference... and most importantly, my eye is still having trouble focussing. I kept the appointment that I made last week and took the day off to see the doctor. Again I was sitting in a waiting room full of people suffering from god-knows-what. It was well over 45 minutes before I was called on... Oh well, at least I got caught up on my current events :p I managed to read through a few interesting articles in this months Time Magazine.

Finally, my door opened. "Hey kid, what's going on? Are you sick?" :P My physician is great, he's watched me grow up and I never mind visiting him... even though it's never a good thing when you have to visit the doctor. I fill him in on my situation and when I get to the part when the clinic doc said it was a stye I was met with a priceless expression :D his hands dropped down to his sides and he began to shake his head!

"A Stye? Do you know what a stye is? Did she explain it to you"?
"Um... ya. It's like a pimple".
"Yes, a pimple. Pimples don't affect your eyesight!".

I was trying not to laugh because he was do dumbfounded by her diagnosis. He sat me down, turned off the lights and looked at the backs of my eyes. Nothing wrong with my retina... vitrious fluid is ok... there's nothing obvious. So then I got him to feel where the bump was... and reminded him that it feels like there's something scratching my cornea. I layed down on the table and he inverted my eyelid.

"Oooooooh... I see what you mean". It's never a good thing when your doctor sounds surprised O_o
"It looks like you have a meibomian cyst".
"Uhh".
He then proceeds to make his way out of the room and tells me to follow behind him. "Ok, I'm going to refer you to an eye specialist, we have to try to get you there pretty quick".

The receptionist called the specialist and setup an appointment for me. They said that they had a spot open for Friday, but I'm being squeezed in on Thursday.

At this point I'm getting a little worried but after doing a little bit of research it seems that it's a pretty standard operation. We'll see! ...