Yeah I was kinda disappointed too. The crs looked like he was under 40years old too.i will look up some other crs in my area and maybe they can tell me over phone if they would recommend at least a cream or not.

Delasama and you should be, after all you are suffering all this time with the pains and struggles of having a fissure.
That is why I love my CRS he at least is more caring and re assuring.
I guess that is because I am a woman, but still we suffer the same when it comes to fissure, men and women.
I think you will do no wrong shopping around.

Hi, glad you finally got to see your CRS. Each doctor has their own way of treating things and you have to be able to trust what they tell you. If you feel comfortable with his opinion it probably won't hurt to try his approach, but if you don't feel good about his advice seek a second opinion. As far as topicals go, they can help a great deal. They don't necessarily heal a chronic fissure put they can reduce the pain from spasms. As far as surgery is concerned it can be helpful. I find it refreshing to find a surgeon who doesn't automatically jump into surgery. He should have left the door open to that option though. I've seen a lot of doctors and they've told me to do the least amount of surgery in the rectal area as possible. You do not want to cause repeated scarring because that can cause a host of problems down the road. None of my doctors recommend removing a skin tag. You run the risk of causing another area that won't heal. At least that's what I was told. They also tend to shrink when the fissure heals or when it isn't active. I hope you continue to heal and listen to what he says about miralax. I didn't listen at first and I wish I had. I listened to other people who kept telling me you'll become dependent on it, blah, blah, blah, but the truth is you have a fissure and will be prone to them and keeping your stools soft and easy to pass are a must for life. It's really no different than a person taking medication for blood pressure for life. All the best Suzy.

Thanks guys/gals I looked him up and he only has five years experience. I found another crs in my are with 14 years and left a voice mail for his nurse to call me back. :D

I had to go to three different CRS's before I found the right one for me, so you are definitely not alone. And I completely agree with jr2 about going ahead and making an appointment with a third CRS just in case since you are under a time crunch with your insurance.
In any case, I wouldn't go back to the first CRS if I were you. Any chance he operates his practice out of a hotel room?

That is good Delasama, I knew you would not just leave it like that.
I was lucky enough that when my regular doctor that I have known for a while ask me if I wanted to see a CRS for what I thought was hems I told her to find me the most experienced one and she didn't disappointed me.
Sometimes we need to shop around until we find something that we feel comfortable with.
I learned that with fissures is always a surprise element, while you can sometimes see the outside or beginning of your fissure and can tell if is healing or not, we never know how that fissure extend once in the inside, some doctors will only check the outside to later on discover that is more inside and worst.
I will neve trust any doctor that just goes by what we tell them and not even look to see for themselves.
I guess that is just the way I am.

thisfissurecankissmybutt wrote:In any case, I wouldn't go back to the first CRS if I were you. Any chance he operates his practice out of a hotel room?

You are funny but to tell the truth I am so picky when it comes to doctors is not funny.
You know when a doctor is that good when patients are asked if they want to reschedule their appointments after waiting for hours for their doctor and they still say they rather wait.
That is how my doctors office is, always full as he does his surgeries in the morning and sometimes you have to wait for 3 hours after you appointment due to emergencies or delays.
People just like him so much. :D Good doctors are hard to find this days.

I called another crs that has more experience. I talked to his nurse and finally talked her into giving me info over phone without seeing me first. She said their crs would have given me nifedipine! She said she will call my crs to get my info then maybe set me up an appointment for a second opinion. I don't have co pays. Which means I have to pay in full until my 500$deductible is met.after that my insurance will cover 80%. I guess after all my other visits last week I will probably paid almost deductible so I might as well go see other crs for second opinion. My insurance doesn't cover prescriptions though.how much is nifedipine ?? I might as well not even bother if nifedipine Is expensive!

I paid about $50 for a 6 week supply (no insurance) from a compounding pharmacy.

That's not bad. For some reason I thought it was like 400$