Complaint Review: Dr. Dario Fernando Cardona - Lakeland Florida

I was admitted to Lakeland Regional Medical Center (hospital) on March 9th 2012 Due to a cyst on my face the size of a baseball. I got to the ER at aprox. 9am (roughly) and seen at Fast Trac and then sent to main ER and then later got admitted and sent to 3rd floor in B Building (new building), this is the cardiac area. I got put there since I was also having
chest pain due to the pain and I have a RX of Tachycardia and high BP (which I am seeing a Cardiologist for. You can also find a report I have also done on LRMC about this whole situation with the hospital as well on this site.

Anyways..... My regular PCP was on vacation so my admitting Dr was a Dr. "filling in" for my PCP. And that was Dr. Dario Fernando. I did not see him at all that Friday (March 9th 2012). I had gotten to my admitting room at aprox. 3pm. He had plenty of time to come and see me. I was in a lot of pain. Granite I am already on pain medication due to having a degenerative disc disease and a bulging disc.... and yes I do go to pain management. That Friday around say 6pm I alerted the nurses that I was in a lot of pain and the pain meds I normally take that they were giving me were not working. The nurse ( RN ) said she would page the Dr. She also said she knew he was at the hospital because she had talked to him a few minutes prior to me letting her know this. Every time she came in to either give me meds or to ask how I was doing I would ask if she had heard from Cardona and she continuously said no. Come bed time (roughly
midnight) I finally got mad and asked why hasn't he called..... it had been hours. So according to the charge nurse on the floor that head paged him even several times throughout the night. And when 7am came around that nurse paged
him as well (when I got up early that morning to take my meds I informed her and she said she would page too). Finally Around noon the nurse came in and said that Dr. Cardona said I can only take the pain meds I am currently taking
(15mg Oxycodone which if anyone knows about pain management, if you have a chronic problem where you have to take something like this on a daily basis, your body does get use to it. Yes I take it for my back but this just wasn't
helping the pain with my cyst on my face). This was the worst pain in my entire life. When this Dr. Cardona finally decided to come see me, which was about 3-4om Saturday March 10th 2012. He was in my room all of 4-5 min. He basically
said, "yep you have a cyst..... when did this start?...... I asked if I could have pain medicine that would work and he said I will see what I can do..... that is all he did.... next thing I know the nurse is coming in and giving me 2 regular Tylenol...... Really? Do you honestly thing with what I take Tylenol is going help the pain more than what I am already taking......
Wow..... he had also referred me to a pain management Dr to come and see me that day or Sunday to possibly give me something that would work.  Anyway.... I also seen the Infectious Disease Dr. Saturday and he put me on a higher dosage of antibiotic twice a day in hopes the infection would come to the surface. Sunday March 11, 2012. I was
waiting for Cardona to come and see me so I could tell him nothing was working for pain. Well Sunday I seen the infectious Disease Dr. He took off the scab and puss was coming out. He swabbed it and sent off to be tested. I was in so much pain I can't even describe how bad it hurt. I asked that Dr. if he could give me something for the pain and he said Dr. Cardona would have to do that.

So once again the nurses, even the charge nurse blew up his pager.  He never called and never came by Sunday, and
the pain management Dr never came by. Later Saturday night the nurse did tell me that the pain management Dr would not be coming by that the hospital is sending someone from the pain management team with the pharmacy to see what they could do. Well they didn't come Sunday as well. With all this and some other things that  happened (read the report on LRMC and you will see what I am talking about) I called the floor manager, she came to my room and I told her how bad the care I was getting. When I was done she called the pharmacy and basically told them to come now. And then she said she would talk to Dr. Cardona. Guess who came to see me finally Tuesday night.....

yep at about 7pm Tuesday night he finally decided to come and visit me. On the other hand the pharmacy management team came by Monday and was able to give me what the ER gave me with the exception I got it only when the dressing was changed. I was fine with that because by that time that was the only time it hurt. I went all weekend in excruciating pain but once the scab had been taking off and it was draining it did help. The next time I would see Dr. Cardona  would be Wednesday. The infectious Disease Dr came by Wednesday March 14, 2012 and said they found out what I had (a type of staff infection) and it is healed up enough where I could go home and take oral antibiotics. He said Dr. Cardona would have to release me though..... He said this around 11am..... at 7:30pm Cardona finally decides o bring his butt to my room (I was in the bathroom) and my husband says let me get her she is in the bathroom, and he says, "no I will just go sign the paperwork to let her go home." He didn't even want to discuss what was happening what will happen,
what I needed to do, or anything. This Dr. has horrible bed side manners. I would not recommend him to anyone. He acts like he doesn't care. 

Not to mention I asked why he didn't want to give me something for the pain and the floor manager, nurses, and charge nurse all said they didn't understand it either. He had the ability to be able to give me something so I was comfortable. And just because I was on 15mg of Oxycodone that seemed enough for him..... just because
I am taking that for my back doesn't mean it will help with the pain on my face (and it didn't at all).

Luckily the pharmacy pain management tech came and seen me and basically said, "OMG he really didn't want to give you anything?" he then asked what I was allergic to. I told him and I also told him I was given something in the ER and it worked for several hours. I was lucky to get the same thing. I think they said it was Dilaudid. This Dr is awful...... do not go to him..... he doesn't care and barely wants to talk to his patients.  I almost walked out of the hospital after all this and the situations happening Saturday night with the nurse I had..... yeah read about that one on my post for LRMC. This Dr. needs to care about his patients more even though I wasn't one of his patients on a regular basis the least he could have done was car. He only seen me 3 out of the 6 days I was there......  bad Dr.