“I was blessed enough, after being diagnosed in January 2007, to actually be seen at the Johns Hopkins Myositis Clinic in Baltimore, Maryland, on April 26th. My diagnosis was confirmed — Dermatomyositis and Vasculitis.
Although it took two months to get an appointment and the clinic is seven hours away from our home I can not recommend this clinic enough! If you are a myositis patient, YOU MUST GO HERE!
After two and half years of not being heard and then misdiagnosed with fibromyalgia, lupus, depression, and mono, this visit was a dream come true. It literally is a one stop shop clinic. I had a mammogram scheduled for 8 a.m., CAT scan at 9 a.m. and then an MRI at 10 a.m. and then my appointment with Dr. Christopher Stine was at 11:15.
When we walked into the imaging center at 7:45 we were literally greeted by a scheduler who was in charge of taking me from one test to another! She was WONDERFUL. While the results were being read, the scheduler gave me and my husband a free coupon for breakfast in the cafeteria (which was not your typical hospital cafeteria — it was wonderful) then they came and got us and escorted us up to the Myositis Clinic at about 11:10. We waited all of 10 minutes total and then I was lead into Dr. Christopher-Stine’s office.
She talked with me and my husband for over an hour, taking notes etc. Then she examined me, left for about 10 minutes came back in and we talked for about another 45 minutes! If I had had all of these tests done in “my neck of the woods” even at the university I’ve been going to for healthcare it would have taken 4 weeks and forever for results.
One of the other things that I really liked about her and Hopkins was that they want to ‘partner’ with your primary health care provider. In other words, because of my distance traveled, if I were having a horrible flare all I would have to do is go to my doctor, show him, he would then in turn call Hopkins OR (she suggested this first) I call her first, go to my doctor and they will work together.
I hope this wasn’t too long and rambling, but I am just so excited and thrilled about this center.”
— E.W.
“I cannot sing enough praises of you all at Hopkins loudly enough. Everyone I saw on Friday was awesome, just awesome. Dr. Christopher, Dr. Danoff and Dr. Golding renewed my faith that there ARE still good, caring doctors still out there. Just wanted to let you all know how much I appreciated it.
People need to know where to find good care because (take it from me) it’s hard to find good,
compassionate care anymore. So many doctors now base their care on quantity of patients not quality of patient care.
Thank you so much for your time and patience as well. Just meeting people that CARE about what they do and the people they do it for means all the world to me.”
— E.M.
“We came to the Myositis Center on April 13 and met with Dr. Golding and Dr. Lisa Christopher-Stein. We were very pleased to have the opportunity to experience their expertise, knowledge and wonderful, professional ‘bedside manner.’
It is a pleasure to work with you and we greatly appreciate your help in getting my husband into Johns Hopkins Medical Facilities. Please let Dr. Christopher-Stein know that my husband is walking some now for the first time since the middle of December. Though he has a long way to go, he is getting better, and he has lost about seven pounds.”
— P.H. and R.H.
“At my last appointment, I told you that I thought Shannon was impressive. Now I think she’s completely awesome, as well. Even though I must have driven her crazy a couple of times recently with emergency prescription requests, she’s been very professional, incredibly helpful, and downright cheerful about it. In short, more than once she’s made things so much easier for me and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that. “
— M.A.
