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> Doctors walk around like gods in the hospital [...] The problem is that everyone is too afraid to correct the doctors when they make obvious mistakes. This i
by et2o 12y ago
> Doctors walk around like gods in the hospital [...] The problem is that everyone is too afraid to correct the doctors when they make obvious mistakes.
This is a blanket statement that is untrue in my first-hand experience as a medical student. If you see a mistake is being made and can back up your opinion, you are treated with respect.
The problem is that medicine is very complicated and there are often not single 'correct' solutions. Given competing reasonable interpretations, the physician liable for the patient will (and should) make the final choice.
There is an alarming amount of anti-physician bias here. Physicians walk around like Gods? No, they walk around like people who generally have a very good clue and years of experience about what they are doing and are constantly attacked for issues outside of their control or completely outside of their patients' understanding, despite their best intentions and efforts.
- jknz 12y ago> If you see a mistake is being made and can back up your opinion, you are treated with respect. Are you treated with misrepect if you feel a mistake is being made, but you can't back it up ? I believe students and young doctors should be pushed towards raising their concerns even if they can't back it up. From an external viewpoint I also believe progress can be made in that direction (I never worked in a hospital).
- et2o 12y agoIf you can't support why you think something is a mistake, why do you think it is a mistake?
- btilly 12y agoYou have implicitly answered the question...and demonstrated the attitude that is the wrong answer. When experienced people see something that doesn't fit, they often don't immediately know what subconscious cue let them know that something was wrong, and it is often someone else who can supply the critical piece of information. If you want good outcomes, you DO NOT push them to suppress their thought process. Instead you encourage them to speak up, everyone tries to figure it out, and then the final result helps train people's intuition of, "This is OK" and "This wasn't, you were right to wonder what about this situation reminded you of that case we saw last year where someone died." If you are serious about finding problems, you need to not prematurely shut off feedback. Requiring people who think something doesn't look right to have backed that opinion up before they speak up is a problem.
- Noxchi 12y agoBecause of feeling? Our subconscious mind recognizes something and predicts a bad outcome, which gives us a feeling of something being wrong. That's what expertise is essentially. Being able to offload things that took conscious effort before into the unconscious. So a bad feeling from an expert (subordinates are experts as well) should be voiced, and investigated.
- jknz 12y agoSay I'm a medical student and during an operation I notice unusual numbers on the screen. I don't even know what the numbers mean (hey I'm a student!) but they look freaking unusual. Should I tell Dr. God about these numbers ? Last time he told me to shut up because I could not support my concern. There are hundreds of situations where you believe something is a mistake but can't give clear supportive arguments. I hope blaming young medical professionals for raising their concerns in these situations is not the norm.
- et2o 12y agoPoint taken, but I am not sure about this scenario. You can always ask "What do these numbers mean?" You might look stupid, but I'm pretty used to that by now. The original parent referred to "obvious mistakes" made by physicians, which I don't think your scenario encompasses.