Dr. James Madison Blake Jr, MD

Dr. Blake had been my mom's go-to gastro for many years. I took her to him because she was having some a bizarre gastro chemical reaction - I will spare readers the ugly details. I explained the 1st acute event as I had observed it and that it had occured a few times since then... an obvious volcanic chemical reaction, as observed. He was very condescening and laughed at me, saying "the human body just doesn't work like that - all she needs is some antacids". I implored him to do an endoscopic test... and after a significant discussion between he and I, he set it up - in his words, "to prove me wrong". At our follow up, he said, "like I explained to you before, sometimes there is a chemical reaction that occurs between what you have eaten and what is still in your stomach so long it has fermented. It's a little like mixing vinegar with baking soda to create a science fair volcano. In your case, you have a narrowing of the area where digested food leaves the stomach. We found a… lot of scar tissue down there." I was livid. She did wind up getting treatment for the condition, but had I not insisted on the test, it's hard to tell how long she would have suffered and how much further damage would have been done before he took it seriously. He was just going to tell her to take antacids!! One mistake does not make a bad doctor, so I gave him 2 stars, but his lack of empathy and haughty attitude in this instance takes him off my list as a good doctor.