thanks!
2007-12-02 08:49:04 · 13 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Medicine
graydoc6 is right on the mark. Expectations have changed, over the years. My greatest frustration was having patients demand expensive testing without allowing me to even take an appropriate history and preform a basic physical examination. You have to get to know the patient before you can "treat" anything.
As to the comments about "curing" as opposed to "treating", I can get a chuckle out of them. When you get down to it, life is a terminal illness. The only "cure" for life is death. This issue also opens another area of great controversy in the US today, the "quantity" of life versus the "quality" of life. I always spent a lot of time discussing quality of life with my patients, but they did not seem very interested in it. They were always more concerned with the quantity. No matter how little or much pain and suffering grandma might be experiencing, and no matter what we offered to increase grandmas level of comfort, the only question that many families wanted to ask was, "How long can we keep grandma alive?"
Cancer patients do feel like they are under treatment forever, and they are. But ask yourself this-"How long can cancer patients be active and productive today, compared to forty years ago? The answer is clear. Most cancer patients, even those acknowledged as terminal aree living comfortably and longer than ever before. Progress is slow, but very visible, if you look at changes over the past forty years.
Yes, treat the patient. As I think about it, I never did have a disease walk into my office and ask for treatment.
2007-12-02 10:28:25 · answer #1 · answered by jpturboprop 7 · 2⤊ 0⤋
The old time docs didn't have many effective medicines, but they were very skilled at ministering to the patient's concerns. Nowadays medicine is very technical, and the human element is often forgotten.
Nevertheless, a patient's feelings are important, and any good doctor will try to include them in the mix.
On occasion, however, a doctor has be realistic. The extreme example in my career was telling a family whose religious convictions proscribed blood transfusions that there was no other way I could treat their baby who was born with hemophilia. They went to another practitioner; I don't have any follow-up.
2007-12-02 09:14:03 · answer #2 · answered by greydoc6 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
a GOOD doctor should treat the whole patient, not just the disease. What good is it to treat someone who has a weight problem, if they don't address what's causing it? IE. depression? You must look at the whole patient.
2007-12-02 15:14:25 · answer #3 · answered by kimmyg 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
So, as a resident, I can't tell you how many times I've heard the expression "Treat the patient, not the disease."
The idea being you're tailoring your care to give the patient the best possible outcome/quality of life, and not just throwing all the indicated medications at someone without noting how it's affecting them
BTW, the person ranting about cancer being a money maker has some issues.
2007-12-02 13:23:28 · answer #4 · answered by Jay 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
in theory they should treat both. but most doctor today are only looking at the diagnosis and treatment plan. I have been ill for 26 with multiple Dr over the years and It's appalling.
They can't even remember what they are doing to you if you pass them in a corridor, One Dr told another one that I was doing much better after I was getting Rx injections. Which I had just got the first one 5 minutes before as ordered by the dr. and the idiot could not remember he never saw me in between (5 minutes) and that the Rx would not have any effect that quickly
He also put me on 60 mg prednisone which almost killed me and made me 100 % diabled but he ignored that and said it was my illess causing the weakness. Steroid myopathy is a common side effect of prednisone and he did not know that. He and other Drs treated me based on my bloodwork, not how I felt.
Seek at least one second opinion on any serious long term treatment plan!! If your Dr does not treat you like a human being switch -- run out of his office and tell him (usually) or her why you have fired him.
2007-12-02 08:59:10 · answer #5 · answered by realme 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I second the resident doctor above me, I am a second year student, we hear "treat the patient, not the disease" all the time.
2007-12-02 15:10:35 · answer #6 · answered by Troy 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Patients first then disease
2007-12-02 11:15:28 · answer #7 · answered by sa_2006 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Both the patient and his/her disease. A doctor cares for a patient's mental health and well-being as well as finding a cure for the disease.
2007-12-02 08:52:24 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 2⤋
That depends on where in they country you are seeing a doctor. In Chicago, they treat both the patient and the disease. If you are in North Carolina, they don't treat either. They just send you a bill.
2007-12-02 08:56:56 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 2⤋
the patient and after the disease or the contrary it depends of the gravity of the illness...doctors must also be "patients"!
2007-12-03 01:12:19 · answer #10 · answered by kodye 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋