I saw my rheumatologist yesterday to get the letters I needed for school. As I suspected, she doesn’t use real letterhead. Now, I can make up letterhead in MS Word that will look extremely professional, and nobody will know that it didn’t come from a printer. But that isn’t the case with her office.
No, the appearance of a letter depends entirely on who typed it up. I had actually written drafts of the letters for her, knowing from past experience that it isn’t possible to get anything but a hand-scribbled note from her any other way. I took them to her on a floppy disk.
One letter, done by someone who I believe to be the office manager, has an almost-passable letterhead look. Except that there are no phone numbers, which is a pretty standard thing for letterhead.
The other has the name of the practice, address, phone, and fax numbers in great big letters centered at the top of the first page. They look like a title and subtitle for a report.
In any case, the disability office at SPSU isn’t exactly the pinnacle of professionalism, either, so I doubt they’ll care. Fortunately, the pseudo-letterhead version is the one that went to my department, which is full of people who do very much notice such things.
I did get the “and I want a pony” disability letter. As I explained to the doctor, I’m asking for every kind of accommodation I could possibly think of. Even if I don’t need it. I know they won’t give me a quarter of them, but I’ll try, dammit. The doctor had absolutely no problem signing it, though she made a couple of changes.
I noticed after leaving the office that I have some new official diagnoses—enthesopathy, ankylosing spondylitis, and DDD. She’s mentioned the second thing in the past, although before I think she just said something about “spondyloarthopathy.” I think DDD refers to degenerative disc disease—or at least, that’s the only likely thing I’m finding via Google. Those with medical knowledge are definitely asked to correct me or shed light on “DDD.”
