4 ms·
I feel it's the other way around. I am a sample size of one; the doctor's experience, and the experience of the people who trained that doctor, is a far larger
by ubernostrum 11y ago
I feel it's the other way around. I am a sample size of one; the doctor's experience, and the experience of the people who trained that doctor, is a far larger and more reliable sample, and so the doctor's diagnosis is more likely to be correct (absent any other information) than mine.
My go-to example here is a few years ago I had unbelievable abdominal pain for a day or two and saw a doctor about it. And the first thing the doctor thought it was -- gallstones, which I ended up having a mildly-complicated and expensive test for -- turned out to be completely wrong. But I don't fault the doctor for that: it was, given what I was experiencing and my family's medical history (multiple people who had to have their gallbladders out due to gallstones), the most likely cause, to such an extent that focusing on anything else until it had been ruled out would have been a bad idea.
(it turned out to be inflamed cartilage in my ribs, which was the second thing investigated, once the abdominal ultrasound ruled out gallstones)
- shostack 11y agoExcept medical knowledge is not like pushing up a code commit. A new break through comes out, but it takes time for it to filter its way through the medical community, get doctors educated, convince them to change their ways, etc. Doctors are often required to get a certain number of CME credits every year, but there's no guarantee they'll be 100% current on the cutting edge of your issue. So if a doctor can lag behind from an education standpoint, is that an opportunity for a patient to help fill in gaps if they are willing to invest time? Please make no mistake, I largely agree that doctors are much better at considering the options and diagnosing accordingly. My point is that they are not omniscient, and new developments in medicine happen all the time. While a specialist might be expected to be more current in their specialty, a general practitioner might not be.
- MichaelGG 11y agoWe should be free to push a doctor on things and have them answer as to why we're wrong. I can only imagine that must be very annoying to doctors. After working even with technical clients that manage to misunderstand and come up with all sorts of troublesome reports of non-issues, it's easy to get complacent. While it's not a good use of resources to run all sorts of tests for everyone, the tradeoff changes for you individually. Sorta like how the fox is only running for its lunch while the rabbit is running for its life. The limiting factor is probably the reliability of tests: get enough done and you'll find _something_ that looks wrong but isn't. Wikipedia lists hospital error as the leading preventable cause of death[1]. The source used notes "Serious harm seems to be 10- to 20-fold more common than lethal harm.". I'm a bit biased due to repeated experience. I lost one child due to being overly deferential to doctors instead of pushing a harder (trivially preventable issue). I saved another after flat-out rejecting the analysis of a nurse that appeared to be having trouble with simple math (after insisting on being re-evaluated, the child was rushed to emergency care; issue avoided - even got an apology). It reminds me of patio11's advice on salary negotiation. A bit of discomfort while discussing the subject vs a large payoff. I'd prefer to feel a little uncomfortable and annoy a doctor with a few additional questions, piss of a nurse for double-checking their work, given the stakes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preventable_causes_of_death https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preventable_causes_of_death