Comment by bccdee
2 days ago
I assume the doctor was just wrong. It happens. I imagine doctors get patients coming in saying "look, I have this extremely specific syndrome. I diagnosed myself based on the Wikipedia page" all the time. Usually those patients are wrong and it's something simpler, but sometimes they're right, and this time the doctor's simpler explanation was wrong. Never attribute to malice what can be easily explained by stupidity, etc.
Of course, I don't know the actual situation, but this seems more likely to me than a doctor who doesn't care about their patient's health enough to spend 10 seconds diagnosing them. At the very least, I expect they're investing enough effort in their job enough to avoid transparent malpractice.
I’ve personally been incorrectly diagnosed with a life altering condition. When it became more and more clear that the diagnosis was wrong the doctor just doubled down. When I said I thought he was wrong and refused to see him he sent a colleague after me to another hospital to try to persuade the medical staff there of the misdiagnosis. That thankfully failed, but the whole process very much left me with the impression that the only thing that mattered to him and his colleague was to be “right”. My health was completely irrelevant to them. And nobody put them in their place.
Sure, I’m a big believer in Hanlon’s razor. But there comes a point when you have to conclude that something is seriously wrong. My feeling is that it’s a complete lack of consequences that is the core problem. Nobody is ever “forced” to admit they were wrong. Some people can’t handle that, start believing they are always right.
(This was in Sweden and malpractice is a bit different here.)
1177 is the best, or not..