4 ms·

As someone who's experienced the medical system for the past 6 years (family and personal illness) and know many medical professionals, the level of arrogance,

by noam87 10y ago

As someone who's experienced the medical system for the past 6 years (family and personal illness) and know many medical professionals, the level of arrogance, ignorance and lack of professional integrity frankly borders on criminal. It is long overdue to shed light on this issue. Good doctors are few and far between. Stories of mind-boggling ineptitude are so common that my only advice is: if you ever find yourself in need of medical care for anything major, your number one priority is to do your own research and micromanage your physician at every step to ensure he doesn't fuck up. Or he will. Big time. From the diagnosis stage to the treatment stage. Question his every decision because your life depends on it. Trust me when I say this advice could save you from so much pain and sorrow many times over. I speak from experience. No not just one occurrence that left me bitter, but seeing it happen over and over. Being in a position where your life or the life of a loved one depends on people whose judgement you don't trust can be really emotionally taxing. I would go into specifics, but this is not an anonymous account. I can only say in the medical profession, ineptitude and arrogance are the norm. The stories you read in these threads, they are common enough that I've seen these things happen again and again with my own eyes.

6stringmerc 10y ago
As much as somebody might read the above and say, "Oh wow, it can't possibly be that bad! This sounds like an axe to grind!" - hold that thought. There's a lot of truth to what's been listed above, and the message that your #1 priority should be to micro-manage your care is actually good advice for above-average intelligent people. I can't stress this enough. As with the parent comment, I shy away from sharing too much personal information about my own health battles. They are from birth, ongoing, and likely to stick around until I die. Want to hear something that would shock you? My parents were advocates for my care and our insurance would pay for an innovative, proven type of new corrective surgery. The "Team" of a Head Doc and a couple others on his staff said over and over that my parents were being too pushy and that they would be the ones to decide when I would be a candidate for that surgery. My parents questioned their integrity, because it was obvious that I was a candidate. The Head Doc got very arrogant. My parents got legal. What did they find? In the Head Doc's own notes, and agreed upon by his team in private, that I was an excellent candidate for the type of surgery being mentioned. They were lying to us, and for what? We got a different Specialist after that. I'll never forget that lesson though, and later, having seen that Head Doc at an industry event later in life - he noticed I was doing well - to which I replied that indeed I was and no thanks to him either. Glad that asshole has retired.
- kharms 10y ago
  >There's a lot of truth to what's been listed above, and the message that your #1 priority should be to micro-manage your care is actually good advice for above-average intelligent people. I can't stress this enough. You can micro-manage yourself to an early death thanks to the Dunning-Kruger effect. If you can afford it, a good course of action is to (a) get second opinions from trained professionals, and (b) research your doctors.
  - Scoundreller 10y ago
    and (c): independently evaluate the evidence yourself. It's almost all public knowledge. If your clinician feels very strongly one way, but it isn't supported by evidence, then something might be very wrong.
- ChrisDutrow 10y ago
  What was his motive for lying?
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
vgoh1 10y ago
I see a lot of posts on this thread blaming overworked, tired, well-meaning professionals that just can't do right, but I think you hit the nail on the head. In my experience, arrogant pricks are just attracted to becoming medical doctors. I haven't gone to the hospital or doctors too much in my life, but every time, I come away astonished at their attitude, and wondering how is it that people can call a doctor a hero. When I went to the hospital to get my gall bladder taken out, I was in the worst pain of my life. I needed pain killers, and could hardly talk, and they spent 10 minutes getting my billing information before a doctor would even see me. When the doctor finally game in, I wasn't screaming or anything, even though I wanted to, just curled up in a ball, and the doctor rolled his eyes at me like a teenage girl - I instantly became more scared of being cut opened by one of these assholes than of the pain I was in. Before this, I had been misdiagnosed several times - I had to figure out it was my gall bladder from Google, and work hard to convince my doctor to even explore the possibility it was my gall bladder. I had to TELL HIM that not all gall stones are visible on an ultrasound. Before that, I had minor bladder issues, which the doctors turned in to a major issue by constantly putting catheters up me, and prescribing me several medicines to "see if they work" even though they all said to not take if I was experiencing the exact same symptoms that I had told them about. I almost had a surgery for the problem - my doctor would always tell me that the surgeon would discuss possible side effects before the surgery - I was trying to get info at least days before the surgery, so I could sleep on it and make an informed decision, but I wasn't able to talk to him until right before they were going to put me under. When I continued to press him for questions, he was huffing and puffing, like a teenage girl, any other grown man would have been embarrassed to act like that. After pressing him, I finally found out that a very likely side effect of the surgery would have put me in a much worse situation that the problem they were going to fix - it would have turned minor but annoying irritation into me needing to wear adult diapers for the rest of my life! And he was visibly angry for having to tell me that! Of course, I canceled the surgery. I could go on and on, like how I was lied to about my bill, telling me it would be around $250, but was really $2000, for tests that i didn't want, and knew would come up negative, or how my daughter was born early but healthy, and simply in the NICU for observation for 2 weeks, at $5000 a DAY, sitting in an OLD incubator, with one nurse watching a few kids. I, for one, can't WAIT until WATSON takes all their jobs.
- 10y ago

by noam87 10y ago

6stringmerc 10y ago

As much as somebody might read the above and say, "Oh wow, it can't possibly be that bad! This sounds like an axe to grind!" - hold that thought. There's a lot of truth to what's been listed above, and the message that your #1 priority should be to micro-manage your care is actually good advice for above-average intelligent people. I can't stress this enough. As with the parent comment, I shy away from sharing too much personal information about my own health battles. They are from birth, ongoing, and likely to stick around until I die. Want to hear something that would shock you? My parents were advocates for my care and our insurance would pay for an innovative, proven type of new corrective surgery. The "Team" of a Head Doc and a couple others on his staff said over and over that my parents were being too pushy and that they would be the ones to decide when I would be a candidate for that surgery. My parents questioned their integrity, because it was obvious that I was a candidate. The Head Doc got very arrogant. My parents got legal. What did they find? In the Head Doc's own notes, and agreed upon by his team in private, that I was an excellent candidate for the type of surgery being mentioned. They were lying to us, and for what? We got a different Specialist after that. I'll never forget that lesson though, and later, having seen that Head Doc at an industry event later in life - he noticed I was doing well - to which I replied that indeed I was and no thanks to him either. Glad that asshole has retired.

kharms 10y ago
>There's a lot of truth to what's been listed above, and the message that your #1 priority should be to micro-manage your care is actually good advice for above-average intelligent people. I can't stress this enough. You can micro-manage yourself to an early death thanks to the Dunning-Kruger effect. If you can afford it, a good course of action is to (a) get second opinions from trained professionals, and (b) research your doctors.
- Scoundreller 10y ago
  and (c): independently evaluate the evidence yourself. It's almost all public knowledge. If your clinician feels very strongly one way, but it isn't supported by evidence, then something might be very wrong.
ChrisDutrow 10y ago
What was his motive for lying?

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

vgoh1 10y ago

I see a lot of posts on this thread blaming overworked, tired, well-meaning professionals that just can't do right, but I think you hit the nail on the head. In my experience, arrogant pricks are just attracted to becoming medical doctors. I haven't gone to the hospital or doctors too much in my life, but every time, I come away astonished at their attitude, and wondering how is it that people can call a doctor a hero. When I went to the hospital to get my gall bladder taken out, I was in the worst pain of my life. I needed pain killers, and could hardly talk, and they spent 10 minutes getting my billing information before a doctor would even see me. When the doctor finally game in, I wasn't screaming or anything, even though I wanted to, just curled up in a ball, and the doctor rolled his eyes at me like a teenage girl - I instantly became more scared of being cut opened by one of these assholes than of the pain I was in. Before this, I had been misdiagnosed several times - I had to figure out it was my gall bladder from Google, and work hard to convince my doctor to even explore the possibility it was my gall bladder. I had to TELL HIM that not all gall stones are visible on an ultrasound. Before that, I had minor bladder issues, which the doctors turned in to a major issue by constantly putting catheters up me, and prescribing me several medicines to "see if they work" even though they all said to not take if I was experiencing the exact same symptoms that I had told them about. I almost had a surgery for the problem - my doctor would always tell me that the surgeon would discuss possible side effects before the surgery - I was trying to get info at least days before the surgery, so I could sleep on it and make an informed decision, but I wasn't able to talk to him until right before they were going to put me under. When I continued to press him for questions, he was huffing and puffing, like a teenage girl, any other grown man would have been embarrassed to act like that. After pressing him, I finally found out that a very likely side effect of the surgery would have put me in a much worse situation that the problem they were going to fix - it would have turned minor but annoying irritation into me needing to wear adult diapers for the rest of my life! And he was visibly angry for having to tell me that! Of course, I canceled the surgery. I could go on and on, like how I was lied to about my bill, telling me it would be around $250, but was really $2000, for tests that i didn't want, and knew would come up negative, or how my daughter was born early but healthy, and simply in the NICU for observation for 2 weeks, at $5000 a DAY, sitting in an OLD incubator, with one nurse watching a few kids. I, for one, can't WAIT until WATSON takes all their jobs.

10y ago