I work for CW doctors and sometimes their advice makes me cringe page 4

[Quies]

It's all about perspective.

How about this perspective?

You tell a doctor/nurse/whathaveyou "If you do A then B will happen." They do A and don't believe that it is B so they treat you for X.

Who is responsible for your health at that point?

[meeme]

In my case I could, in fact, teach my gastro specialist a few things about my supposed 'rare' disease but he already knows it all. If I were to follow his advice I'd be in worse shape. Just a fact and I'm not alone. Gluten is really messing people up. My GP was the best...came to see me every single day I was in hospital even though there wasn't a thing he could do for me. When the kidney doctor said my kidneys had quit and I'd have to have dialysis I said "no way am I living like that"...not going to happen...my GP, who knows me, said he knew I was going to completely recover. He and I were the only ones who knew that I'd make a full recovery and while I know it could have ended differently I really appreciated his support. He listens to me.

I don't think anyone is saying doctors should be blamed for peoples health just that they should learn to listen to their patients with an open mind and be open to new information.

[nixxy]

That's not the kind of situation I'm talking about. But again, they would've been doing what they felt was best. Why would they intentionally do something not in your best interests? Mistakes happen.

[Urban Forager]

My son was in a Children's Hospital last year for 3 weeks and one of the worst parts was the food, it was total junk. The first couple of days DS ordered fish sticks and chicken nuggets for the novelty of it; we never eat them at home and I thought what the heck if he wants to try them fine. He got over it really quick and then every day it was a struggle to find something he could eat, the menu was full of hamburgers, french fries, hot dogs, cheese quesedillas, what they referred to as kid friendly food. Every couple of days I would go out and buy foods that we kept in the nurses station fridge and I would have to ask the nurses for it and then if anything need to be heated I had to walk to the other side of the floor to warm it in lounge not set up for food prep.

Several years ago he had an extended stay at another regular hospital (not designated for children) and the food was so much better. Not only that, there was a fridge in our room and a special kitchen for the parents to use to prepare foods for their kids.
Both of these hospitals are 3 hrs from our home so it wasn't possible for me to cook food at home and bring it in. Next time we are definitely choosing the regular hospital.

[Quies]

That's not the kind of situation I'm talking about. But again, they would've been doing what they felt was best. Why would they intentionally do something not in your best interests? Mistakes happen.

... I am removing myself from this conversation before I start saying things I may regret. This is a real hot button issue for me.

[Urban Forager]

Speaking of doctors not listening.... it took me forever to get my son diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis. His doctor kept prescribing allergy meds, asthma meds and antibiotics. I kept telling him it wasn't working. When I asked "do you think it could be CF?"
( My sister was diagnosed at 50 so it does run in my family.) Doctor said no, he doesn't have the symptoms. Long story short the GP finally sent DS to see an allergist who took one look at DS sinus and said do you have CF in the family? I wish that was the end but then that doctor sent us to do unnecessary and expensive tests. In the end I had to do a lot of research and insist that the doctor order a particular test (very inexpensive) that proved he had CF. Now he gets excellent care from pediatric pulmonologists and DS is doing very well.

[JamesS]

Nix on Ensure and Boost as well, but this is the part that caught my attention:

The patient is losing weight while eating the same.
The NP tells her 'not eating is not a good way to lose weight', completely disregarding what the patient is telling her: that she is eating the same.
Obviously something besides calories is going on.

How about investigating that?
But it is so much easier to assume that the patient is lying or 'just doesn't know'.
While this may be the case, is it something to assume?
How about starting with the idea that the patient will tell her NP the truth. After all, she's there for help, right?

You bring up an excellent point. A cancer patient losing major weight could be suffering from cachexia or malnutrition due to the therapies being given. Either way these need to be addressed.

Ensure definitely is not the way to go. The "nutrition" in the product is crap. Unstable synthetic vitamin C that will be broken down long before the product even leaves the manufacturers warehouse, poorly absorbed forms of minerals and substances considered poisons such as copper sulfate. And what are the main ingredients? Sugars that are not good for cancer patients.

[JamesS]

We're also assuming that medical practitioners actually listen. After four years of doing these kinds of reports, I am NOT a fan of nurse practitioners. A couple of them in this practice sound very good from their reports, but they've got a couple who can't even pronounce the chemo medications correctly and this is an oncology practice.

My mom was 5' 2" and overweight her whole adult life. About 5 years before she died she started gaining weight and gaining a lot of weight. She said something about this to her doctor. She also told him very specifically that she was not doing anything differently with her eating habits. He completely ignored her and just said she needed to lose weight. This went on for a couple of years and she got more and more uncomfortable (and bigger) and finally ended up in the ER having a paracentesis. That's where they basically stick a tube in the side of your stomach and drain out all the fluid that has accumulated. I think that day they took of something crazy like 6 to 8 liters of fluid. But she just needed to lose weight...

She also needed to get a better doctor but no one in this town was accepting new Medicare patients. The fluid was ascites and that is generally (and was indeed in Mom's case) a sign of the liver not working appropriately. Mom was a diabetic and none of this raised a flag for her idiot doctor.

I work for doctors and they provide me a decent living, but some days ...

What's really amazing is that the doctor did not see a problem with the elevated ALT/AST that would have been on the blood work as these tests are part of the normal panels.

I have worked with a number of idiot doctors though and watched the numerous mistakes they made on my grandfather and friends. So I am not surprised though since I have only known a few doctors that had even had the slightest clue of what they were doing.

[JamesS]

Does anyone know anything about Dr Mercola? I've heard good things about him as well but haven't read much on his website...I'll be honest his selling products puts me off. Thanks for the rec. PP1.

I used to like Mercola, but he has gotten to the point where he simply parrots whatever is popular at the time on the internet without bothering to check if the claims are factual. I have written various posts elsewhere debunking so many of his claims with actual evidence. Particularly his bogus claims about soy and claims he has made about cancer.

He also tends to contradict himself. For example, he bashes soy since he is on the payroll of the Weston Price Foundation. But the things he claims are toxic in soy such as phytoestrogens, protease inhibitors, phytic acid (inositol hexaphosphate), etc. are also found in flax seed that Mercola claims is a "superfood". Flax seed for example contains nearly 4 times higher levels of phytoestrogens than raw soy and even a higher level compared to cooked or fermented soy.

He also produces a concentrated resveratrol, which is a phytoestrogen. Yet he falsely claims that phytoestrogens cause cancer birth, defects, etc. Therefore, in my opinion he just says and does whatever it takes to make a buck with no regard to facts.

[JamesS]

Holy Crap! As someone else who is epileptic, I know what you mean about some MDs not listening. I have had to work my way through several neurologists. I have a thread about My Epilepsy Experiment you might find interesting about trying to control seizures with a ketogenic diet.http://www.marksdailyapple.com/forum/thread64225.html

Have you been using any of the suggestions I gave you to actually get rid of the seizures?

Um, there have been accusations that Mercola gets paid to endorse "the miracle supplement of the month" so those things I would take with many grains of salt. But I think he does have some basic good advice on nutrition such as sounding the alarm that soy is not the health panacea

Mercola's claims about soy have been seriously debunked. And some of his claims were so ridiculously out in left field that I am surprised anyone would take him seriously.