Basically no scan for broke people

Exactly

This is why you need a universal health care system.

That's why it's so important for the Doctor to consult with the patient and ask their opinion.

@@SapphicSammy7 I already know what my opinion is. I want the doctor to TELL me what I SHOULD do. Period.

Absolutely right.

@@wholeNwon yeah and that's also kind of an issue, I hate when doctors give me TOO MUCH say in what happens. I trust my doctors opinion because that's what we should do, trust the professionals. But I do think asking the patient what their opinions and preferences are rather than ordering them. For me it would look like me and the doctor coming up with a choice that I'm happy/comfortable with and will also be the most effective. c:

That’s what I would want for myself and loved ones. To feel like I’m part of the treatment process, not just a subject with no autonomy

This! This is why I can't accept the "but it's tricky :(" cop out from doctors. If you don't know what a patient would prefer, just ask. It's really that simple.

​@@fariahcriss5696 The problem that the average person is unaware of is a thing called "incidental findings". Classically this will be something like a kidney cyst, diverticular pockets in the colon, empty sella on MRI etc... Patients with symptoms who are overly eager to find a cause will request imaging that will find one of these incidental findings that are not the cause of their symptoms 99% of the time. But these patients who are eager to find a cause will usually attribute their symptoms to these incidental findings & spend a lot of time/money unnecessarily getting work up for these. Then ultimately the frustrated patient finds themselves in the same position, with no answers, after spending months & lots of $$$ on unnecessary tests (not to mention unnecessary radiation). These things are important to consider and a lot of the time the best thing to do is nothing. Myself as a doctor I've had symptoms in the past that would be concerning to a regular person (if you went on Google it would tell you that I had bowel cancer). I decided to sit on it and wait, and the symptoms went away on their own. No unnecessary radiation or colonoscopy needed. Sometimes watchful waiting is in fact the best approach, despite how unpopular it is with patients.

✨ communication ✨ ​

Sorry, but sometimes you just don’t know. It’s different if it’s a car and you’re not sure if it’s the transmission or something else. With a human, you need to be sure. You have many other factors to juggle, including cost, insurance coverage, etc. It’s tough to get a non-answer or wait for it, but that is life.

Yes, my doctor will say "it's most likely xyz, if you want more testing done we can do abc but I don't think this is life threatening so you can think about it".

That's awful. Guessing you are American?

😢

@@lauranagy yes. You would think that such an advanced country would have better health care.

Wow, you are so lucky and smart to check it out right away. For must people it would end up being nothing, but in cases like yours, you avoided so much pain and suffering. Good for you and I hope you stay healthy for the rest of your life.

@c0ltz450 yeah! I think my little sister having hers burst put me on edge, I have pain daily and it wasn't that abnormal but the location of it was what freaked me out and got it checked

I was life flighted to a hospital last year and my husband had to drive the 2 hours up. He stopped first to take a video of the helicopter then raced home to make sure our neighbors could watch the dog before he drove up to check on me. I wasn't mad😅

​@darcistephenson5359 I too love helicopters and I would also take a video of the helicopter. They are really cool machines/vehicles. I wish I could fly them.

What do you do for living to have a 100% healthcare cover?

​@@user-px9by3ye2r^this. I want to know too...

I was admitted with “mild uncomplicated diverticulitis” the next day my bowel perfed. Diverticulitis is no joke

@@A---ti3zz It's awful! I am surprised they admitted you right away. I've had it many times and always sent home.

@@Joy21090​​⁠they didn’t. I had it for six months. It took five months for them to find it and then a month of oral antibiotics that never got rid of it so they admitted me for iv antibiotics. Perfed the next morning. My CT scan in the ER said mild uncomplicated diverticulitis. I don’t know how a person goes from mild uncomplicated diverticulitis to a perforation in less than a day. Seems like the radiologist missed something

@@A---ti3zz Oh my heavens! That's extremely scary. I hope you are completely well now.

@@Joy21090thank you! Lost a part of my colon and had to have a colostomy for 4.5 months; I’m convinced nothing good comes from surgery on a persons gi tract. Hope everything is going well for you!

I wish I knew where you find doctors like that. After 3 doctor visits, the first time being prescribed please take your blood pressure meds, the second please take these antidepressants, the third I really don't know and please come back in a couple weeks, my mother passed out in the parking lot of the grocery store and was rushed to the hospital by ambulance where they finally gave her a scan and found the recurrence of her acoustic neuroma which she had had 19 years before, which somebody might have noticed if they had checked her medical records. By the time she finally got an appointment for a surgical consult with a neurosurgeon it had been 3 weeks and she came home that night with pneumonia and back to the hospital for another 10 days after which she died. A certain amount of time later the doctor's office called to remind us of the surgery the next day and I said "don't bother, she's dead" The doctor who insisted and kept insisting that I really should get a measles vaccine despite the fact that I had already had measles and the concept that what if you get pregnant? I told the doctor I wasn't going to get pregnant. I was 23 then. I'm 65 now. I have no children. The time I got sun poisoning and I was at work and they sent me to medical and the doctor thought I had scabies and gave me quell, and I went to my regular doctor and he said it was eczema - it was. Good thing I didn't take the quell. Sometimes people need to calm down. And the time I went to the doctor with my toe having so much eczema that it was weeping and spongy and he looked at it and said I have no idea what that is and called in his colleague who had no idea either. I got a pain in my face in 1986. I'm still waiting to find out what it is. It's not sinus, it's not trigeminal neuralgia, and it's not TMJ. I had a CAT scan an MRI and evoked potentials which were aborted when they wanted to shock me behind the ankles. A neurologist said I had muscle spasms in my face - probably true. Don't know why. Can't fix it. Try this drug. Yeah that worked... But when you stop taking it, it comes back.

​@@pamelajaye, Wow! Sorry you went through all that. I think doctors guess most of the time and 90% are incorrect. 😢 Hope things get better for you.

This, especially when it's already been weeks/months since the problem started.

*in your healthcare system

Not if you live in a country with Universal healthcare

Hi, I agree, but I'm in the US! I'm genuinely curious if you think costs like this are universal? Most places, no matter their GDP, don't feel this and I am curious!

@raeandringa7260 I live in Germany and everyone has to be insured (I think about 0.1% aren't). So everything that is medically necessary will be paid and the copay is usually no more than 10€ ($11), if you are poor you might not even have to pay that. And there is a maximum copay per year (2% of the yearly household income, if you are chronically ill 1%)

Wait you mean no one opted for an ultrasound first? My insurance would always say ultrasound and then if there's nothing conclusive CT scan. Unless you're in the ED.

That's what the job is supposed to entail, but after a decade of training that message gets hopelessly lost. That's how we end up with a supreme court & physicians debating whether to offer treatments (i.e. abortion or gender affirming hormones, etc.). It's great they have opinions, but the patient should always be in the driver's seat.

See, 99% of the time, I agree. But then again, antivaxxers exist...

@@teutonicsniper2502 Ethically it’s a really tough nut to crack. In a situation where lack of vaccination has been definitively proven to cause harm to those other than the patient (i.e. polio, etc.) legislative bodies need to step in to legally mandate it. I would be careful about advocating for any sort of physically compelled medical treatment, however, and prefer financial incentives like fines instead. In the case of a parent refusing to vaccinate a minor against diseases with a significant mortality rate, that could and probably should be classified as some form of abuse or neglect. In that case I think the state should educate the minor on the benefits and risks of vaccination as well as it can for their age group, and allow them to consent or assent to receiving it.

Honestly, that’s perfectly appropriate medicine. Antibiotic overuse is a massive problem and the vast majority of sore throats are viral. Waiting until you had more specific bacterial symptoms to start antibiotics is very sensible.

@@mahoganywolf8843 Not that I disagree with your premise but that's not the point. Clinical suspicion of strepA is enough to justify antibiotic usage, as if it goes untreated it can cause serious complications, and the tests are.. not 100% accurate.

@@mahoganywolf8843 I guess it would’ve been better if I mentioned that at the time I was a frequent strep case, I had it about seven times in 10 months and I still had doctors insist that I couldn’t possibly know my own body well enough to know that I had it.

​@kathrynmcarthur8026 Yeah you have to always advocate for yourself. Most doctors don't know everything you know about your body. You really are your best doctor because you know yourself best. Although it would be nice if your doctor knew everything, they just can't. No disrespect to any nurses or doctors but accidents are one of the leading causes of death in hopsitals. The best people in the medical field can really do is try and treat the most common/average problems. There's just too many patients, not enough nurses/doctors to look for the very specific things at first. That's why you give your own input, be your own advocate, help the doctors by guiding them in the right direction.

Bro. So my strep always presented as a weird mix of strep and the flu. I had chronic strep as a kid, well documented. I completely had it, but the nurse we were put with was convinced that I didn't and refused to do the test. Ended up going to the ER 2 weeks later with untreated strep a a very irate ER nurse (not at us). Oh! We also got pulled over for going 4-5 mph over the speed limit (totes normal in Cali) and he Gave My Mom A Ticket. Even though I was actively puking while he was talking to her.

Yes! Or even better is when the doctor "thinks aloud" - something I as a patient always try to encourage (because I know not everyone likes this). Especially in cases like these that are sufficiently vague/multi-faceted that many different pathways are equally reasonable. Sometimes 10-15 minutes of "thinking together" (I already have a reasonable layperson's knowledge of anatomy) is much better than a battery of tests.

there's probably a few more alternatives but if the patient denies trying anything then I mean, that's on them.

Indeed. Physicians, and many other healthcare professionals seem to forget that they are not, in fact, in charge. They work for the patient :)

Ovarian cyst rupture is painful but shouldn't cause sepsis

Have they at least offered any ideas for _treating_ the constipation/gas?

@@m136dalie good to know they even got THAT wrong then! 🤣

@@Asptuber don’t be silly, they said “just go home and try to go to the toilet” and i looked them dead in the eyes and said “sir, i was going to the toilet all of yesterday, i seriously don’t think that’s actually the issue” 😅 for real though, i have a condition. i’ve been constipated my whole life, got really serious gut issues, so i know when a pain in my body is a normal pain, as opposed to the agonising “you’re going to pass out imminently” kind of pain that my cyst is causing me regularly 😅 i use laxatives once a week now, to ensure the pipes are clear but so as to not build up a tolerance (been there, it’s hell 😅), and the gas issues will be with me until i die, as it’s just a part of my EDS 😅😬 if you have any tips though, i’m always looking to improve my bowel health and motility, and i’m not going to Dr Google, i find experience-based testimonies are far more worthy of my time and effort 🤣

@@astralloser1177 That's bad care. So sorry it happened to you. No tips and tricks here (or at least not anything you haven't heard before; the kind of fibre you tolerate, caffeine/other stimulant, enough hydration yada yada) - guts are very personal and _weird_. I consider myself very lucky in that department - once I accidentally severely cut down on caffeine while on a road trip and it was not a good experience. Not a good week. Since then (15 years? 20?) I'm a bit paranoid. Not terribly found of yoghurt, but weirdly enough it seems to help a bit, so that's my go to when my guts start to get gassy and/or (minorly) constipated. (Also I find "the kind of fibre YOU tolerate/like" to be important. There's no blanket wonder-fibre, guts are individual. My guts tend to react well to novelty, first billberries of the summer always gets things moving. A few weeks later? "Meh, we know what this is, we'll move as usual".)