4 ms·

All told I had a pretty fun time trying to self-diagnose myself, and I did a better job diagnosing myself than the docs I saw. I firmly believe that the only re

All told I had a pretty fun time trying to self-diagnose myself, and I did a better job diagnosing myself than the docs I saw. I firmly believe that the only reason I’m not on disability and unemployed is because I took my diagnosis and treatment into my own hands. That said, if I had to do that 20x per day with only 20 minutes allotted per patient, I can’t imagine I’d be very good at diagnosis either.

_yb2s 4y ago
I just wish I could find a doctor that was open minded, and would discuss things. I have a PhD and do research in a medically related field, and will deeply read all of the scientific literature about any conditions I have, yet I still get the "just shut up and do what I say- your google search is not equivalent to my medical degree" treatment. I would like to be engaged by the doctor as a sort of collaborator on my medical issues, rather than be treated like an infant. My feeling is they are hiding behind the "I'm the expert here" thing because they are actually self conscious about how little they know, and are worried it will show if they engage in a discussion.
- 2devnull 4y ago
  This is my great frustration. They are trained to detect “narcissistic” patients, and having seen some of those training videos, I now understand that their treatment of patients who try and reference the literature is guided by that training. I have to pretend to be stupid and find weird “people hacks” because I can’t just come out and say, “here is a recent meta analysis in nejm that says x. Could you read that sometime in the next few weeks and see if it applies?” Often it’s not even recent research but common knowledge you can find in bio 101 textbooks or Wikipedia. But asking questions the wrong way, you can come across as “thinking you know more than the clinician” (you do!) so you have engage in bizarre kabuki theater and feign ignorance hoping they feel the urge to revisit their textbooks, or google it.

_yb2s 4y ago

I just wish I could find a doctor that was open minded, and would discuss things. I have a PhD and do research in a medically related field, and will deeply read all of the scientific literature about any conditions I have, yet I still get the "just shut up and do what I say- your google search is not equivalent to my medical degree" treatment. I would like to be engaged by the doctor as a sort of collaborator on my medical issues, rather than be treated like an infant. My feeling is they are hiding behind the "I'm the expert here" thing because they are actually self conscious about how little they know, and are worried it will show if they engage in a discussion.

2devnull 4y ago
This is my great frustration. They are trained to detect “narcissistic” patients, and having seen some of those training videos, I now understand that their treatment of patients who try and reference the literature is guided by that training. I have to pretend to be stupid and find weird “people hacks” because I can’t just come out and say, “here is a recent meta analysis in nejm that says x. Could you read that sometime in the next few weeks and see if it applies?” Often it’s not even recent research but common knowledge you can find in bio 101 textbooks or Wikipedia. But asking questions the wrong way, you can come across as “thinking you know more than the clinician” (you do!) so you have engage in bizarre kabuki theater and feign ignorance hoping they feel the urge to revisit their textbooks, or google it.