I recently asked my doctor to take a look at a rash on my arm. She thanked me for not trying to diagnose it myself. Two of the doctor’s prior patients that day had searched for their symptoms on the Internet, then informed her of what they had. Their self-diagnoses were wrong, but one of the patients still insisted that he had shingles. She finally said, “If you want to have shingles, fine, but take this medicine for what you really do have.”
At Bottom Line/Personal, we often report on the importance of playing an active role in our medical care—but sometimes patients’ attempts to do this undercut a successful working relationship with their doctors.
According to Steven Z. Kussin, MD, founder of The Shared Decision Center, which helps patients make informed choices, and author of Doctor, Your Patient Will See You Now (Rowman & Littlefield), the secret to getting doctors to respond to patient input with respect is citing sources of information that doctors respect. Your doctor might roll his eyes if you say you found a natural remedy on an Internet chat room—but you should get his full attention if you point to a medical journal or a respected publication such as Bottom Line/Personal.
When you mention an article to your doctor, preface your comments with, “You know I trust you and rely on you, but I’m wondering…” This acknowledges the doctor’s importance, further reducing the odds of ruffled feathers and fostering a team approach.
Kussin also recommends that patients focus on understanding conditions that they’ve already been diagnosed with, rather than trying to self-diagnose their medical problems. Such self-diagnoses usually fail—and those who attempt them often scare themselves unnecessarily with unlikely worst-case scenarios.
