Seeking advice on unsuitable care
Hello everyone, I'm hoping to find some advice here. TLDR: I feel that workers comp has not taken care of me adequately or in a timely enough manner which I believe has led to prolonged temporary disability and potentially exacerbation of the initial injury.
I slipped and fell at work on April 11 and landed on my knee, reported the incident to worker's comp, and went home. I was offered either telehealth or in-person for my first appointment, and I opted for telehealth, because I was in a lot of pain and didn't want to drive somewhere. She asked me questions, didn't want to see the bruising and swelling on the knee though. Told me to ice and elevate, and that I'd be given a followup telehealth appointment in a little over a week. Told me she would send orders for an x-ray and also send a brace for my knee. I missed the call about the brace where they wanted to verify my address and size, but when i returned the call later that day, I was completely unable to get in touch with the adjuster. (Later down the timeline, I was told that the original doctor never ordered an x-ray, and that the brace had already been sent, which, 5 weeks later, still hasn't come). A few days into the week, i let my adjuster (the only person who has contacted me at this point) know that I was in an immense amount of pain and that I needed a sooner followup. She offered another telehealth and I told her I wanted someone to physically look at it, not just ask questions. She said she'd try to get me an in-person appointment. I asked about getting x-rays and she said there were no orders from the doctor for that. Over the next few days she was impossible to get ahold of. I'd send emails, leave voicemails, and she wouldn't return them. It got to the point where my boss started trying to contact her as well. I ended up going to urgent care on April 18, where I was given x-rays and a bandage wrap kinda thing, and was told the same advice as before, but also told to wrap it for compression. She gave me a prescription for an anti inflammatory pill. She also made a note that i can't return to work until I get an MRI and have a followup after that. I let my adjuster know that I went to urgent care, and when she reached back out she got noticeably upset with me, told me that I can't just go to any doctor, that I have to get it approved first if I want workers comp to pay for it. Told me not to do that again. I told her I didn't know what else to do, that i felt very in the dark and didn't know how else to try to manage the pain. She said she would get me an appointment for an orthopedic doctor, and within a few days I had an appointment for April 30. I was then transferred to a new adjuster, who went over all the details on my case to verify, and discovered that the original adjuster put the wrong date for when I started missing work (she cut an entire week out). He told me he wasn't sure what took so long on each step, and I told him that the original adjuster told me it was because the new adjuster was out of work for the week, and he told me that was not true at all. So im not sure what was going on with the original adjuster. I was finally given an appointment for an MRI for May 18, five weeks after the injury. This whole time, i have had very minimal instruction on managing the pain, taking best care of the injury, etc. I was left to use my knee for the five weeks, with no way to keep weight off of it, and even with barely using it, i was dealing with a lot of pain just from small trips to the bathroom and back. I haven't been able to even pick things up from my floor without pain; i have been useless and stuck sitting on my bed in order to not be in pain. I had to send my nurse case worker a long drawn out text about my pain, my mental health suffering (5 weeks of sitting in bed without working, being able to clean after myself, unable to fully shower due to pain, being clueless about injury, etc has led me to being extremely depressed, also not eating due to the depression caused me to lose 6 pounds in one week, keep in mind I have been doing zero physical activity) and that's when I was finally offered crutches and a shower chair. Now that I have the MRI results, I have no idea when my follow up will be, as the MRI appointment was made 3 weeks in advance. I'm suffering physically, mentally, and financially, and I feel like my injury is potentially now worse due to the combination of lack of instruction, the need to bear weight for 5 weeks, and the lack of urgency in the matter. I know in my state (NC) you can't sue for pain and suffering, but you can get a workers comp attorney. Now I'm sure I left out some details that would be helpful, i have all the documents and emails I just didn't reference everything for this post. Can anyone steer me in some direction to get more help than workers comp is offering?