The Return of Vintage DI S E A S E S

[sheeplady]

http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/16/health/ohio-mumps/index.html?c=us

And sadly, that is so poorly written that many people will take away that most people who got this outbreak of mumps were vaccinated, so therefore vaccination does nothing. Is it too hard to put in a sentence that explains the relationship between herb immunity and outbreaks in vaccinated populations?

You break herd immunity and the herd gets sick.

 

[Stanley Doble]

Maybe if doctors told the truth we wouldn't have to get our information off the internet. I have been told some truly bizarre, untrue things by doctors. If I listened to them I would undoubtedly be dead now. To be fair, without their help at a couple of crucial times I would likely be dead anyway. It's a fine line.

 

[Zombie_61]

Maybe if doctors told the truth we wouldn't have to get our information off the internet. I have been told some truly bizarre, untrue things by doctors. If I listened to them I would undoubtedly be dead now. To be fair, without their help at a couple of crucial times I would likely be dead anyway. It's a fine line.

What do you call the guy who graduated last in his class at medical school? Doctor.

Being a doctor, nurse, or any other healthcare position is no different from any other profession--some people are better at it than others. I've dealt with doctors who were really on their game, others that didn't seem to know much more about medicine than I do, and just about everything in between; the trick is in recognizing which is which.

 

[Stanley Doble]

Every doctor I have ever dealt with, without exception, was a liar who would say anything that popped into his head if he thought it would do him or his "profession" the slightest bit of good. If it hurts or kills the patients that is their funeral. There are plenty more where they came from.

I used to trust doctors, even more than other experts. It took me a long time to get onto them. Even today I would have a hard job going against a doctor's advice. I know the internet is a poor source of medical advice but it does tell the truth, sometimes. Not so doctors.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I've known some very good doctors -- like the one who was a close friend of our family for many years -- and some very poor doctors -- like the one who killed my older brother. Some of them are people who go into the field because they sincerely want to help people, and some of them are arrogant jackasses. It's up to the patient to be willing to stand up in the face of poor treatment and not feel intimidated.

A doctor isn't God. The doctor is providing a repair and maintenance service, the same as the mechanic who services your car or the furnace guy who keeps your burner running or the plumber who unstops your toilet. If you were dissatisified with the service you were getting from any of those people, you'd find another provider. A doctor should be no different.

As for the internet, there's good information among all the foolishness, but all too often it's taken out of context and misinterpreted by people with an agenda that has nothing to do with improving anyone's well-being. Most of those people aren't any kind of a doctor -- they're trying to sell you something, whether it's a product or a set of beliefs.

 

[Babydoll]

My dad had polio as a kid. I grew up seeing the side effects of the disease that he deals with on a daily basis. I also think about my Grandma, and how scared she was that her son was so very sick, but they didn't fully understand why. To have those that willingly skip the vaccinations of this disease - well, it is assinine to me.

We have a 4 year old that is current on all of her shots. There was no question to us whether to vaccinate or not. I'm giving her a huge advantage (against preventable diseases) that I'm sure Grandma would have jumped at if she'd had the chance.

 

[Stanley Doble]

I'm not talking about competence. I am talking about simple honesty. When it comes to competence they are not all they are cracked up to be either but they could at least tell the truth.

As for getting another doctor, a chance would be a fine thing. It took me 14 years to get the one I have now. There aren't enough doctors to go around in Canada, you are lucky to see one at all.

Talk back and see what it gets you.

 

[LizzieMaine]

As for getting another doctor, a chance would be a fine thing. It took me 14 years to get the one I have now. There aren't enough doctors to go around in Canada, you are lucky to see one at all.

Talk back and see what it gets you.

It's not any better here, despite what the propagandists will tell you. I go to a doctor sixty miles away because none of the locals are "accepting new patients."

As I say, I've had some good doctors and some really lousy ones. I've had no problem telling the lousy ones what I think, and once they see you're not going to be intimidated some of them will have the candor to admit they're making up a lot of it as they go along. I had an unusual condition years back, something most doctors didn't know anything about, and I had to really press my point sometimes to emphasize that I had a better idea of what was going on with my own body than they did.

A white coat isn't any more impressive to me than a pair of overalls. It's, as you suggest, the competence that counts.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

"Somewhere out there is the world's worst doctor. And somebody has an appointment to see him tomorrow!"
...George Carlin

 

[LizzieMaine]

"Somewhere out there is the world's worst doctor. And somebody has an appointment to see him tomorrow!"
...George Carlin

Unfortunately so. But I think the important thing to remember is that if your doctor turns out to be an incompetent butchering hack you -- or your heirs -- have legal recourse against that doctor. There is a mechanism of accountability there, and it affords at least some measure of protection against incompetence.

But when you take health advice from J. Random Axegrind on the Internet, there's no accountability at all -- it's like America at the turn of the century, before the Pure Food and Drug Act, when any quack with a keg of grain alcohol and some flavoring extracts could cook up a "cancer cure" in a three-legged iron kettle in his cellar. You don't know what you're getting, whether it's an "alternative medicine" or a philosophy, and you don't know who's selling it to you, whether it's somebody who actually has some sense of what he's talking about or some gibbering glue-sniffer, and if it ends up hurting you, you've got absolutely no recourse.

Given the choice, I'll take my chances with the doctor.

 

[Stanley Doble]

I take my chances with the doctor too but I don't believe what he tells me unless it is confirmed by 5 independent witnesses.

 

[Zombie_61]

With regards to health care here in the U.S. (and in other countries as well, I'm sure), the other thing to remember is that the biblical phrase "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil" comes into play all too often. There's something very wrong with the system when a group of people who deal with insurance decide to override a doctor's recommendations for treatment.

A couple of years ago a good friend received a call from his insurance company regarding his wife's medical treatment. She had been diagnosed with cancer (not her first bout) and this call, which they had waited several months for, was to inform them that her doctor's recommendations for treatment had been rejected because her case was deemed "not serious enough" for such an expensive procedure. He sat patiently and quietly while the insurance agent explained the procedure for re-submitting the request, making sure to emphasize the importance of including new developments in her "case". His response of "That won't be necessary; my wife died two days ago from the cancer that wasn't serious enough for you to spend money on her treatment," was met with stunned silence, at which point he simply hung up the phone. Admittedly, the type of cancer she had was one of the more aggressive forms and her doctor had informed her that her chances of survival weren't favorable, but expeditious treatment without interference from their insurance company might have given her a fighting chance.

 

[LizzieMaine]

With regards to health care here in the U.S. (and in other countries as well, I'm sure), the other thing to remember is that the biblical phrase "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil" comes into play all too often. There's something very wrong with the system when a group of people who deal with insurance decide to override a doctor's recommendations for treatment.

The health insurance "industry" is the dirtiest, bloodthirstiest shakedown racket ever allowed to inflict itself on the American people. When the tumbrels finally roll, that's where they'll start loading up.

 

[ChiTownScion]

But I think the important thing to remember is that if your doctor turns out to be an incompetent butchering hack you -- or your heirs -- have legal recourse against that doctor. There is a mechanism of accountability there, and it affords at least some measure of protection against incompetence.

But when you take health advice from J. Random Axegrind on the Internet, there's no accountability at all -- it's like America at the turn of the century, before the Pure Food and Drug Act, when any quack with a keg of grain alcohol and some flavoring extracts could cook up a "cancer cure" in a three-legged iron kettle in his cellar. You don't know what you're getting, whether it's an "alternative medicine" or a philosophy, and you don't know who's selling it to you, whether it's somebody who actually has some sense of what he's talking about or some gibbering glue-sniffer, and if it ends up hurting you, you've got absolutely no recourse.

Given the choice, I'll take my chances with the doctor.

I'd agree, and I go beyond the title as well and try to research the doc's C.V. Fair or not, I have a bias against third world FMG's and in favor of top U.S. medical school grads. Where they did their undergrad work, and if they have published peer reviewed research can come into play as well. I usually want to know where the residency was served as well as the status of board certification.

One of the nicer aspects of Chicago is that there are four world class university affiliated teaching hospitals here, and it does attract some superb medical practitioners in all recognized specialties. Without being too alarmist, that is something we have to consider when the time comes to decide where we will retire.

 

[sheeplady]

I'd agree, and I go beyond the title as well and try to research the doc's C.V. Fair or not, I have a bias against third world FMG's and in favor of top U.S. medical school grads. Where they did their undergrad work, and if they have published peer reviewed research can come into play as well. I usually want to know where the residency was served as well as the status of board certification.

One of the nicer aspects of Chicago is that there are four world class university affiliated teaching hospitals here, and it does attract some superb medical practitioners in all recognized specialties. Without being too alarmist, that is something we have to consider when the time comes to decide where we will retire.

I went to a good university for undergraduate and was a biology major. I was in the leagues of many individuals who were pre-med; who would become doctors. (Many of them have.) Some of them I would not let touch me as a patient. If I walked into their office, saw them face-to-face, I would walk out. I've seen unethical cutthroat behavior that disturbs me so greatly that I would not want them treating me, my husband, or my child. I don't think you can be that way high school through residency and then turn it off. I understand that doctors (especially doctors in certain areas of medicine) need to have a certain amount of detachment in order to survive the profession. This is not detachment.

I fully admit I want a personal touch from a doctor. I'm a cancer survivor (one year out from diagnosis) and I was faced with two choices for a doctor. I went for the one who gives hugs. He's kind. When you're freaking out about a PET/CT and are an absolute mess because you have to spend the next 24 hours an arms length away from your toddler daughter without touching her- which doctor do you want? Do you want a doctor who's going to tell you your chances or a doctor who will say everything is going to be OK (no matter what happens) and give you a hug?

I want the doctor that gives hugs.

When it comes to things like cancer and heart disease, there are protocols and standards. It is not like it was 30 years ago, when NY, Chicago, and Boston were doing groundbreaking things in treatment and you were pretty stuck if you couldn't get there. The treatment I got was the exact same treatment I would have gotten if I went to some big city (defined as "standard"). But I got to be at home with my husband and daughter, which is important. I'm not trying to dissuade you, or change your mind. But as someone who has very much "been there" when it comes to facing an issue that could take my life, I would want to be at "home" and not at a major medical treatment center. But then, I am a lot different than a lot of young people who have had cancer and I admit that.

 

[Baron Kurtz]

This debate played out here in a huge way with very prominent scientist/medics claiming that MMR vaccine caused autism. A huge number of people chose to avoid these vaccines (even the individual ones), around the time I was getting mine, and cue the resultant spike in cases some years later. 'Course it turns out the "evidence" was based on flawed, very complex, statistical measures.

I'll add to this that I couldn't get married in Indiana as my wife to be couldn't prove she'd had a Rubella vaccination. Assurances that we didn't intend to have children fell on deaf ears, with the assumption of procreative intent being enshrined in law. ho hum.

Vaxxing my child doesn't necessarily protect her from getting the disease

I must say I love this slang. (Vax being a brand of vacuum cleaner.)

 

[HudsonHawk]

I'll add to this that I couldn't get married in Indiana as my wife to be couldn't prove she'd had a Rubella vaccination. Assurances that we didn't intend to have children fell on deaf ears, with the assumption of procreative intent being enshrined in law. ho hum.

Why didn't she just go get vaccinated?

 

[sheeplady]

I must say I love this slang. (Vax being a brand of vacuum cleaner.)

That's a nugget I picked up from the Mommy boards. There's vaxxers, anti-vaxxers, vaxxing, etc. If you ever want to see crazy, look at a parenting forum (Mommy board) for a vaccination debate. I can tell you right now, you may think you've seen crazy. You haven't.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

I won't say that vaccines cause autism but I am concerned about the heavy metals found in many vaccines such as mercury which is used as a preservative. Those kinds of toxins in your system definitely can't be a good thing.

The anti-vaccination debate is nothing new. An early proponent of the anti-vaccination movement was illustrator Johnny Gruelle (best known today as the creator of Raggedy Ann). Gruelle's daughter Marcella died at age 13 of complications from a series of vaccines given at her school without parental consent.

 

[HudsonHawk]

I won't say that vaccines cause autism but I am concerned about the heavy metals found in many vaccines such as mercury which is used as a preservative. Those kinds of toxins in your system definitely can't be a good thing.

I know a little (more than most people, I'd say) about the toxicology and human health risk of mercury. What specifically concerns you?

BTW, mercury is no longer used in vaccines.