4 ms·
Considering how common some version of this story is, and based on my own experiences as a patient, I'm convinced that most doctors lack a functional understand
by 0xcde4c3db 2y ago
Considering how common some version of this story is, and based on my own experiences as a patient, I'm convinced that most doctors lack a functional understanding of conditional probability. They seem to think that if the prevalence of a disease in the general population (or a specific patient's age/sex/racial demographic) is low, then the probability of someone presenting with signs and symptoms of the disease having it is also low, even if there's no better explanation.
- jimmaswell 2y agoCould there be a hundred people claiming fantastical symptoms for every one person who's genuine?
- Palomides 2y agothe reality is that very close to 100% of people have ambiguous, transient pain and a large number of them come to the doctor asking for something to be done (and also mix in people who are fishing for pain meds, really are hypochondriacs, or really are experiencing something psychogenic) in a practical sense, it's extremely difficult to narrow that down to a specific actionable cause, and the system is simply not set up to deal with this stuff
- atahanacar 2y ago>They seem to think that if the prevalence of a disease in the general population (or a specific patient's age/sex/racial demographic) is low, then the probability of someone presenting with signs and symptoms of the disease having it is also low Because it is also actually low. Signs and symptoms aren't exclusive to specific diseases.