Comment by soulofmischief
2 days ago
In an ideal world maybe, but in the real world, most doctors are conditioned by US propaganda and the War on Drugs. Their views are compromised.
Furthermore, I've had mixed experiences with health professionals. It took me 10 years across multiple clinics and states to get diagnosed with gout that I've had since at least my late teens. Laughed out of multiple doctor's offices because I'm a "healthy young male" even though each day and night was filled with excruciating pain and drastically reduced mobility. "Full test panels" that specifically did not test my uric acid, because no healthy young male has gout.
No mention of gout ever to me, of course. I had to self diagnose as the disease progressed due to lack of treatment. Got my diagnosis confirmed by a physician's assistant, because both doctors at that clinic were on vacation at the same time for like the third time that quarter. He ordered a uric acid test, and was surprised that I'd never been offered one.
Both doctors had literally laughed me out of the office over the previous months. But I was persistent and it turns out the physician's assistant there was both more thorough and more knowledgeable than either doctor, helping me finally begin a path to treatment. I was damn near about to kill myself from a decade of extraordinary pain. From my discussions with older, typical gout sufferers, my case is extraordinarily bad and most of them only experience mild pain.
It's equally as silly to place 100% trust in doctors as it is to place 0% trust in them.
Isn't every medicine a drug, since a drug with medical application in the right dose is just called medicine?
No.
Guess we have different definitions then. In the usage I got to know, every medicine (besides placebos and household remedies) are drugs. This was supposed to be a nitpick and a rhetorical question. Care to elaborate how your definition differs? Do you think yours is general for english/US?
When there's millions of doctors, not only are there going to be more mediocre doctors than anything, but there has to be a bottom of the barrel as well.
It took me years to be diagnosed with PTSD, a problem I knew I had. Because I am not a vet, I had to go through every other diagnosis first -- schizo, bipolar, borderline -- each with a new set of pills to take. Some of the shrinks who diagnosed me wouldn't do anything but open my file, make some remarks, and fill out a prescription, with nary any eye contact.
Finally got a very expensive doctor who wasn't under the thumb of insurance companies. Her first question, upon hearing my issues, was "how is your sleep?" "I don't, really" was my reply. Screened me for PTSD and I clocked 76/80 pts. She set me up with the proper therapy, and within a year, I was screening at 30/80 pts. All it took was asking me one question that wasn't loaded towards the doctors favorite diagnosis & prescription.