Posted by Alan on November 18, 2002, at 19:32:12
In reply to Not a top pdoc... (nm) » Squiggles, posted by JonW on November 18, 2002, at 18:24:30
I think JonW makes a good point.
In any profession there's the usual median of competant but relatively uninspired part of the workforce. Translated to the medical profession, those that don't treat individuals as individuals and are content to take their instructions and treatment modalities from whatever comes their overburdened way.
My guess would be that there are the passionate doctors that do care about individuals (as opposed to "cases") ranging in the upper 10th percentile. There are probably many that exist right there within the constraints of the NHS, HMO's etc but have nowhere to go with it due to these monstrosity, cookie cutter conglomorates.
I personally had to go outside of this sphere to find an independent acting, compassionate, and very bright pdoc and suffered many years unnecessarily before find one of them. (It cost me in $$$ and time and suffering immensely to get there so no lines please about how privilidged my American heritage somehow "provided" me with this "priviledge").
They're out there alright. The road to finding them is often a hard one often found by either sheer luck or doggedly stubborn research on the patient's part.
The problem is that those with disorders don't often have it in them to survive the quest and throw up their arms assuming that the present treatment they're on is the best that psychiatry has to offer them.
That's why these bboards are invaluable - a worldwide sounding board for the "secrets" of mental illness that have before gone unsaid because of the stigma surrounding mental health and keeping it in the family or amongst best friends, etc.
But back to the point. There are probably 10 at the most in 100 that will know their stuff and have a combination of compassion and intuition to make a meaningful difference in their patient's lives. The rest are probably doing more harm by their lack of engagement - those in the remaining 90 percentile.
One other thing.
Someday, someone, somewhere is going to explain sufficiently why benzodiazapines are not offered to the patient on an equal footing in the first place with all of the other forms of chemotherapy available. The overprescription of Valium over 30 years ago is getting to look like a fairly obselete excuse in the years 2002 - 2003.
I understand the overall life-cycles of psychotropic drugs but this pushing aside of bzds is being driven by what I think could reasonably be included in the next DSM manual V as "benzophobia". Ironically, the idealological docs out there would have to be put on a bzd and receive psychotherapy themselves for their "phobia".
Alan
poster:Alan
thread:128043
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20021116/msgs/128183.html