Comments on: What’s Wrong With American Doctors?

By: Michael Mahone

Michael Mahone — Wed, 01 Feb 2023 18:48:22 +0000

Been to several doctors regarding bowel problems, not one even suggested doing an examination of my intestines until I suggested it to them. When they finally did test me they found something but the results were “inconclusive,” after which the doctor told me “I’m not a miracle worker.” I finally self-diagnosed my Crohn’s through internet articles and began treating life accordingly which has led to a massive improvement, despite one doctor telling me that it definitely isn’t Crohn’s because the symptoms didn’t line up exactly. American medical degrees aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on and the majority probably came from a Cracker Jack box.
I’ve got more medical knowledge than most people who went to college simply because I’ve had to diagnose and treat all my own issues.

By: CG Brady

CG Brady — Sun, 24 Apr 2022 21:29:01 +0000

In reply to rmcnutt. I have come to believe that nature trumps nurture when it comes to depravity. This is why we need rules and laws and why these laws and rules need to be enforced strictly. The American medical industry constitutes 20% of the US gross domestic product. Americans pay three times the world average for healthcare. Leading cause of preventable death in America is it healthcare system. American healthcare is the only industry that makes more revenue by being incompetent and cruel.

By: C G Brady

C G Brady — Sun, 24 Apr 2022 21:23:13 +0000

American healthcare is driven by greed and greet only. The more they screw up with medical errors, misdiagnosis and healthcare infections or money they make. Don’t get philosophical about it because it all comes down to money which is always the lowest common denominator. This is the only industry or being bad at your job creates more revenue.

By: Casey Pastine

Casey Pastine — Sun, 25 Jul 2021 19:43:06 +0000

Actually, there is more of a problem with doctors doing diagnosis with no scientific backup than you realize. None of the doctors I have seen in the Denver area test for fungal illness of any kind but yeast. They won’t even entertain the idea anyone can have one. I had sinusitis for twenty years and not once in that time did any doctor ever test me to find out what I had. They guessed off the top of their heads, gave me different antibiotics, made me sicker, and then told me they couldn’t find anything. Even though their nurses and aids would tell me that I couldn’t cough in their waiting rooms.
A friend of mine went to the emergency room in incredible pain. The doctors there told him “its the flu. Go home”. His father slammed one of them to the wall and said “My son is dying, find out why!” They ran some tests and found he had a Meckel’s diverticulum. That is what they called it, and they removed several feet of necrotic intestine. he would have died if went home.
I can go on. Doctors are doing lazy diagnoses more and more. Also, they are a good 30 years behind the rest of the biological sciences when it comes to understanding that new illnesses are going to occur due to climate change. We are finding new illnesses in the marine environment at astounding rates, but human doctors won’t even look for any unless their patient is dying, and sometimes not even then.
And don’t get me started on how these doctors are ignorant of the immune system problems of the elderly, alcoholics, and drug addicts. I have looked up the studies done on the subject and even tried to show them to primary care physicians in the area. They don’t even look at them. Since alcoholism is a major killer in the country, I would think you all would want to know something about it. Hardly any of you do. Go ask a primary car doc about why you have all the symptoms of thyroid deficiency and your thyroid levels are normal. Will he/she look at your liver? No.

By: Dr. Whiting

Dr. Whiting — Sun, 07 Jan 2018 19:47:36 +0000

I wonder – what if the year was 2078 and a robot was the “doctor” on duty for the day in the ICU. If the robot had ordered Ativan in a timely fashion, would that mean the robot had displayed its “humanistic nature?”
This is not to try and imply that what happened was fine – it was not, it was inexcusable really – but what happened had very little to do with the personality or “humanistic nature” of the physician. What it really shows is that the system is flawed precisely because it depends upon the “humanistic nature” of the physician. There should be fewer and larger ICUs, and they should be staffed sufficiently that the information needed to prescribe the Ativan is immediately available to a physician who is likewise immediately available. There really is very little in common between acute and chronic care and the ICU is no place for the patient’s PCP to be on duty. Let them be the psychosocial consultant (and get paid for it) but acute intensive care needs a dedicated team.

By: rmcnutt

rmcnutt — Tue, 02 Jan 2018 16:03:03 +0000

Thank you for your contribution. There is no excuse for such care. Only recruiting Mother Teresa’s at medical school admission will not help if they bow to the pressures of the system they created. In fact, the present model of education of physicians and hospital care should be scrapped. Power corrupts, so let’s change who is in power.

By: William Palmer MD

William Palmer MD — Mon, 01 Jan 2018 23:25:35 +0000

I wonder if you can abet empathy and compassion by any education or training? Maybe it is 95% nature and 5% nurture? Maybe it would take medical schools to do the job you ask by screening out the applicants who didn’t have these qualities?

The profession attracts people who have intellectual prowess because there is a heap of learning to accomplish. Maybe this will change with developments with AI. But academic success draws in those types of applicants; and those students who might be super humanitarians can feel distanced and intimidated by the pre-requisite and application process.

We had engineers and chemists and bacteriologists in my class at med school….these types not noted for small talk.

Another factor now is the way changing insurance directs the patient to its closed panels. Thus, to have the same doc for twenty years is distinctly unusual. This prevents the intimacy from time and experience.

By: pjnelson

pjnelson — Fri, 29 Dec 2017 03:20:54 +0000

A completely focused physician “geek” would have started a regularly administered, low dose sedative at the time of admission to the ICU. The possible evolving occurrence of unstable delirium tremens (DTs) has a significant association with unexpected death. Early use of the sedative may not prevent a full-blown episode of DTs, but at least you have the advantage of managing a rapidly advancing situation before its unstable. When a medication does not have any real effect, most nurses also know that they would prefer to avoid a disaster by immediately calling the attending physician for a care plan adjustment. It only takes one episode of witnessing a full-blown DTs to know that one is enough for a life-time career, especially for the nurses involved.

The ultimate balance between the scientific and humanitarian attributes that occur for an episode of health care represents either the presence of a gifted physician or a physician in the midst of a career long struggle to find a supportive working environment. Unfortunately, the gifted physicians are rarely recognized by an institution’s ability to offer supportive career development.

By: Steve2

Steve2 — Thu, 28 Dec 2017 21:29:52 +0000

Two things. First, don’t get rid of all of the geeks. You will always need some super smart, OCD types who might not be so great on warm and fuzzy, but you want them around when things are really bad.

Second, patients may benefit directly with the compassion they may feel from a socially competent physician. However, I suspect patients will benefit at least as much from socially competent doctors who work well with other health care workers. Disruptive physicians, nurses and others also, really bring down the quality of care, and put patients at risk. Be nice if the medical schools taught you to work with each other and with other people in health care. (I make it a point to make sure to spend time with med students talking about how to communicate with nurses, techs, etc.and the value their patients will receive if they are good at it.)

Steve

By: DW

DW — Thu, 28 Dec 2017 21:20:19 +0000

I applaud your focus on bedside manner, as it’s a very important component to being a physician. I would argue that it’s less about the education and more about the constraints that the physician is working under. I don’t necessarily think that physicians are more concerned with “getting the job done” than with the patient-physician relationship, as a multitude of polls show that the patient-physician relationship is the primary driver of physician satisfaction in most fields (see Medscape surveys, as one example.)

The problem is, physicians are under immense pressure to see patients as quickly as possible, and the documentation burden is only growing by the day. When you’re measured by your patient’s length of stay or how many patients you can squeeze into a day (20-30 patients for many PCPs), something has to give, and this unfortunately is often time talking with the patient. This deterioration of the patient-physician relationship is a main driver of physician burnout and patient dissatisfaction, but with decreasing reimbursements leading to a push for higher volume, it is only getting worse. Hopefully the patient-physician relationship will regain lost ground, but it’ll take a shift at the policy level rather than just teaching physicians better communication skills. Still, kudos for a well-written article, and I hope that you can continue to share your passion on such an important topic.