In thinking about gathering medical records and keeping track of everything, I realized that I have found one program that’s really intuitive and that’s become second-nature for me.
If you’re female and have menstrual cycles, I’ve found “Monthly Info” to be a very useful website for keeping track of that information. You can register for free, put in the beginning date of each cycle, and it conveniently calculates the average and range of your typical cycle and predicts when your next period will start. And, importantly, you can export or print this with you and take it to your next doctor’s appointment. All of this is completely free. It takes about one minute to register and about 30 seconds to update every month.
I used to keep track of all of this in my planner. (Where “all” means circling a date every month.) But that’s hard to show a doctor, right? Now I just print it out. My gyn loves it. It’s there if anyone needs it. And I put in all my records dating back to 2010!!
Just some thoughts on the topic,
Abigail
P.S. About 200 pages of records were sent to the Clinic of St. Jude & my half-inch binder is filled to the brim. And I still have to pick up records from one more doctor and one more radiology center!! One of the clinics asked if I had a large file. She said that a “large” file happens when someone has a lot of tests or is hospitalized. Well, meet the girl who challenges that definition. My file was 128 pages at that clinic and it’s all from clinic visits and labs. No lab that was done there took longer than 30 minutes. (The ones that were hours long took place at a different clinic.) Abigail buck tradition AGAIN. Of. Course.
hidden courage 