You can barely talk to doctors anymore

PaleMoonlight said:
Sorry about that OP. It's all about profits for them. Doctors have metrics (instructed by the company). I think the goal is only to only interact with patients for only 10 minutes max. It's insane. Plus don't forget, they'll prescribe drugs (that you can end up taking forever) that they make money from. Don't trust them 100%, especially prescriptions.
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Doctors make a commission on prescriptions?

You sure?

Educate me, cause that's some scandalous shit right there.
 
Bornstarch said:
They try to get you in and out as fast as possible.

I've seen so many doctors. Most of them aren't even doctors, but nurse practitioners or PAs. I just saw one this morning and I was in, talked to her for like 30 seconds, then I was on my way home. I got 2 new prescriptions she told me to try. They try to get you in and out as fast as possible. I got a million questions about my bloodwork results, MRI, etc.. but they're having none of it. I'm left to do my own research online.
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That really sucks sherbro :(
It’s fucking frustrating knowing there are doctors out there that can help or explain the best options available for whatever it is you’re going through but it’s near impossible to find or get in touch with them.

My wife was misdiagnosed last year from a Doctor that is very highly respected in his field, but was too cool for school and quickly gave his opinion on what it was and had no time for follow up.
After a few months we wanted another opinion because she was getting worse and found another hospital with a team of Doctors who have taken her on as personal missions to help her, getting her the procedures she’s needed, calling and emailing when they’re on vacation and just really just being incredible people. She’s dealing with some ish still and will be but without them she would’ve died.

If you don’t get a vibe that they care about you then keep looking sherbro.
 
HeffDoesWant said:
Doctors make a commission on prescriptions?

You sure?

Educate me, cause that's some scandalous shit right there.
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Yes and No. They can't directly get paid for each script they write (they can't be like we'll pay you 3 dollars for every muscle relaxer of ours you write) but most doctors have pharmaceutical reps that will give kickbacks if you push their products. Gifts, free trips, cash payments or donations to what is essentially a fake "research fund".

They can and do get money and gifts but not a direct commission. The annual kickbacks is in the billions of dollars per year that's why doctors take part in it.
 
The medical profession is fairly good at diagnosing common ailments. If your problem doesn't fall within the common realm it becomes more difficult to get a correct diagnosis. You might need to see a specialist but that requires your doctor to admit that they can't give a proper diagnosis. You might become a victim of a medical professional's ego.

There are also the medical fads that show up from time to time that range from blood letting to CPAP machines.
 
It's been like this forever.
It's a good thing the internet exists, because these days you are required to diagnose yourself before seeing a doctor.

Every Doctor also has a review on Yelp or Google Maps.
Shopping around for a Doctor is equivalent to eating at a nice restaurant.
 
Best thing you can do is find yourself a primary care doctor you like. Ask your friends for recommendations. A solid primary care doctor makes any other doctor visits much easier.
 
jx820 said:
This can make a huge difference. I live in the NYC metro area and we're flush with great doctors. Quality of care in an urban area or densely populated suburb is generally much better than going to some backwater horse doctor.
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Do you think that you and people in the city are generally healthier than those in rural areas as a result of there being more doctors in your area?
I've yet to see this happen first hand and think modern health care is mostly a big profit driven scam to get you on as many prescription drugs as possible.
 
Rhood said:
It's been like this forever.
It's a good thing the internet exists, because these days you are required to diagnose yourself before seeing a doctor.

Every Doctor also has a review on Yelp or Google Maps.
Shopping around for a Doctor is equivalent to eating at a nice restaurant.
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I was getting so worn out that I googled my symptoms. One possibility was a low blood oxygen level. When I had my second knee replacement about 5 years earlier the low oxygen level alarm kept going off. They blamed it on the sensor clamped on my finger moving. I did see a pulmonologist back then and did a second sleep study. The second sleep study showed the same as the first, that I didn't sleep during the study.

I purchased a $20 pulse oximeter on Amazon. The day I received it, the first use showed 78%. Further tests after resting were in the 80s. According to what I found, anything under 95 is low. A reading of 90% or lower is considered a medical emergency. I called my doctors office and told them my findings. They scheduled me for two weeks later. When I got to the doctor, I showed him the reading on the pulse oximeter which was 81% that day. He said it had to be wrong and had a unit brought to the exam room. It showed the same thing and he looked very worried. He wanted to call an ambulance to take me to a hospital. I told him I would drive there. He didn't think I should drive but I insisted. He called the emergency room to tell them I was coming.

At the emergency room they checked it again and it was still 81%. They got me in a bed and on an oxygen mask. That brought the level up to 85% which seemed to make them even more concerned. They thought I might have a blocked artery in my lungs so they did Xrays and a CT scan and found nothing. They did several blood draws to check the actual oxygen level in the blood and it was still at 85%. I spent 4 hours there while they went through every test they could think of. Then they wanted me to spend the night in the hospital and I declined and signed myself out against medical advice.

After seeing several specialists that they scheduled for me in the next few days, I finally saw a heart specialist who diagnosed it as a atrial septal defect which is a hole in the heart that allows blood to bypass the lungs.
 
Can't get a dr in my rural town so instead I saw a nurse practitioner the other day. She was pretty good overall with my ulcer issue but at the end of the appointment I said can I ask you a few quick things. She looked at me, delayed for a second then said a really slow no. I then also paused for a second and said it's not another medical condition and proceeded to ask her anyways. I'm not making a follow up appointment to ask few questions. Nonsense.
 
Slothbroth said:
Do you think that you and people in the city are generally healthier than those in rural areas as a result of there being more doctors in your area?
I've yet to see this happen first hand and think modern health care is mostly a big profit driven scam to get you on as many prescription drugs as possible.
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Not necessarily. Life expectancy for the urban population skews older but not dramatically. The difference in obesity is pretty dramatic with people living in rural areas being like 5% more likely to be obese.

I think some of that comes down to economics, some of it is diversity of healthcare and food options, some of it is just walking vs driving. A lot of things are just more walkable in the city.

Your doctor doesn't make an extra dollar off your prescriptions no matter how many drugs you take. I briefly worked in pharma, and it's not like in the 90s. The sales reps really can't get reimbursed for anything outside the pharma code. There's still stuff they can do with pharma companies, but it all has to be very above board. If anything they would probably be double dipping on insurance billable services like referring patients to a lab or surgical center they own for a second insurance check.

My experience both as a patient and looking at doctors I know personally is that they genuinely want to help their patients and genuinely care about improving people's quality of life. Plenty of them mess up, or fall short of that goal, or are so focused on doing more overall that they take a path of least resistance and patients fall through the cracks. But overall they're smart, decent, regular people who want to help.

Think about it this way, if you were a doctor would you push unneccessary drugs on people for money? Because if the answer is no, it's a safe assumption most others wouldn't either.
 
My wife is a physician at a family care. She has a patient scheduled every 15 minutes and has to hit a certain number every month. It's not really their fault. They put them under a lot of pressure
 
jx820 said:
Not necessarily. Life expectancy for the urban population skews older but not dramatically. The difference in obesity is pretty dramatic with people living in rural areas being like 5% more likely to be obese.

I think some of that comes down to economics, some of it is diversity of healthcare and food options, some of it is just walking vs driving. A lot of things are just more walkable in the city.

Your doctor doesn't make an extra dollar off your prescriptions no matter how many drugs you take. I briefly worked in pharma, and it's not like in the 90s. The sales reps really can't get reimbursed for anything outside the pharma code. There's still stuff they can do with pharma companies, but it all has to be very above board. If anything they would probably be double dipping on insurance billable services like referring patients to a lab or surgical center they own for a second insurance check.

My experience both as a patient and looking at doctors I know personally is that they genuinely want to help their patients and genuinely care about improving people's quality of life. Plenty of them mess up, or fall short of that goal, or are so focused on doing more overall that they take a path of least resistance and patients fall through the cracks. But overall they're smart, decent, regular people who want to help.

Think about it this way, if you were a doctor would you push unneccessary drugs on people for money? Because if the answer is no, it's a safe assumption most others wouldn't either.
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In your last hypothetical question, you're putting the responsibility of pushing harmful pharmaceutical drugs onto doctors when it's the pharma companies themselves that are responsible for the huge mess that is modern western health care.

Surely you're not really suggesting that things have gotten better since the 90s. They've gotten worse and there are statistics to back it up. I'll come back to this conversation after work to add onto this.
 
jx820 said:
Not necessarily. Life expectancy for the urban population skews older but not dramatically. The difference in obesity is pretty dramatic with people living in rural areas being like 5% more likely to be obese.

I think some of that comes down to economics, some of it is diversity of healthcare and food options, some of it is just walking vs driving. A lot of things are just more walkable in the city.

Your doctor doesn't make an extra dollar off your prescriptions no matter how many drugs you take. I briefly worked in pharma, and it's not like in the 90s. The sales reps really can't get reimbursed for anything outside the pharma code. There's still stuff they can do with pharma companies, but it all has to be very above board. If anything they would probably be double dipping on insurance billable services like referring patients to a lab or surgical center they own for a second insurance check.

My experience both as a patient and looking at doctors I know personally is that they genuinely want to help their patients and genuinely care about improving people's quality of life. Plenty of them mess up, or fall short of that goal, or are so focused on doing more overall that they take a path of least resistance and patients fall through the cracks. But overall they're smart, decent, regular people who want to help.

Think about it this way, if you were a doctor would you push unneccessary drugs on people for money? Because if the answer is no, it's a safe assumption most others wouldn't either.
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Yes? That would be an excellent source of profits to repay my $500,000 medical bill. Hypothetically. Doctors are the most indebted people in America and need money to repay their high interest loans. I don't see how being a good person is going to pay your loan off? Building goodwill takes time. Much easier to collect kickbacks
 
Slothbroth said:
In your last hypothetical question, you're putting the responsibility of pushing harmful pharmaceutical drugs onto doctors when it's the pharma companies themselves that are responsible for the huge mess that is modern western health care.

Surely you're not really suggesting that things have gotten better since the 90s. They've gotten worse and there are statistics to back it up. I'll come back to this conversation after work to add onto this.
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I'm speaking specifically about doctors having a financial incentives to push drugs. THAT was worse in the 90s. Far worse. Viagra was genuinely a miracle drug, but doctors were given vacations, lavish meals, golf outings... anything and everything the reps could write off in exchange for pushing it. Today those reps can't put a tissue box with the brand name on it in the doctor's lobby.

And yes, more people are taking more drugs, but that's not inherently wrong unto itself. The largest generation of human beings ever produced is now in their 60s and 70s and some have real problems that require medicine. Also more drugs are available to treat more conditions. In 1981 there were 0 drugs to treat RLS. Today there are 16 suited to the needs of different patients. That's a lot more people on meds, but it's not a bad thing. No one is abusing Sprycel or Yervoy and no doctor is perscribing those casually to patients that don't need it.

Certainly the opiod epidemic still looms over healthcare but even in the midst of it most doctors were attempting to screen for drug seeking behavior and adicts were seeking out a hand full of pill mills. Trying to hang that on the whole industry profiteering just wouldn't be accurate.
 
Bballfan123 said:
Yes? That would be an excellent source of profits to repay my $500,000 medical bill. Hypothetically. Doctors are the most indebted people in America and need money to repay their high interest loans. I don't see how being a good person is going to pay your loan off? Building goodwill takes time. Much easier to collect kickbacks
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OK, I can see how a bad person would be cynical and see the worst in others. It's both practical and would probably be healthier emotionally.
 
You might have to change your physician. Most NP and PAs don't want to leave the room to look up your questions. They are also overworked.
 
Speaking to them isn't worth much when you find out the majority are fucking idiots and corporate shills anyway.
 
Midnighter said:
Blame hospital boards/admins. Most doctors want to actually help, but are basically forced to get people in and out as fast as possible.
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Yeah this. There are still independent practices out there, but they’re very few these days. Most offices are owned by some corporate health system that also owns the local hospital. Doctors who work for them are contractually required to see 20+ patients per day in 15 minute slots. Family medicine is now corporate medicine.
 
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