Seeking alternative treatment is key to identifying gaps doctors may have missed.
Qn. “I have been attended to by a particular doctor but I feel she often makes wrong diagnosis of my conditions. Can I confront her with alternative views on what I may be ailing from without affecting her attitude towards me?”
It sounds rather strange that you, as an adult can continue to see a doctor that you clearly do not have confidence in. You force me to ask, what is wrong with you?
It is possible that what you present to your doctor is so vague and hesitant that you do not give her adequate information to make a proper diagnosis. It is also possible that you have a doctor who is not qualified to diagnose the condition that you are suffering from.
On the surface, therefore, it would be best for you to explain to your doctor that you are not happy with the progress that you are making so far and that you would like a second opinion.
In years gone by, most doctors behaved as though they were God, and would not hear of another opinion. These days most (good) doctors are happy to refer patients to colleagues for another opinion. Even the most senior doctor can seek the opinion of another.
From the foregoing, you can see that the challenge might be on either side. It could be you or the doctor.
We see many people who have been investigated extensively by other doctors when they come to us. Some do not want to tell us who they have seen and what tests have been done, and with what results.
They think that such an approach might bias us into a particular direction. They try to hide the past history from us.
Recently, we saw a 45-year-old man who came to us with a history of long standing abdominal pain. He had also reported episodes of headache, backache, as well as feeling of lethargy and occasional lack of sleep. Recently, his libido had come to zero and on account of low self-esteem and complaints from his wife, he had found solace in alcohol, which had in turn led to elevation of his blood pressure.
When we saw him, he had a very big file of laboratory tests, X-rays and a big bag containing all manner of tablets from different hospitals and doctors.
Every organ of his body had been investigated by a different specialist who was not aware of the existence of the other doctors and the test results. He did not want to ‘confuse’ the doctors by showing them tests from other doctors.
The doctor for the abdomen treated the symptoms of the abdominal pain because he could not find ‘the disease’.
The specialist on the headache and also the one for the backache did the same. His general practitioner gave him medication for insomnia while the urologist gave him tablets to assist with his erection.
Every day, the poor man swallowed a handful of tablets that in the end made him feel worse. The extensive tests carried out had exhausted his insurance cover.
One of his children who lives in the UK spoke to a friend about her father and when they did a Google search, it was clear that the man had a depressive illness! The multiple symptoms of abdominal pain, backache, headache, lethargy, insomnia were but the somatic (body) expressions of a depressive illness.
When we saw him, he had other clear features of a depressive illness. He work up at 3am and could not fall off to sleep again.
He felt sad and hopeless at most times. He had in the recent weeks felt so sad that he felt a burden to the family and suicide felt like a possible way out.
In one of those states, he had driven to the escarpment hoping to get involved in an accident. When all the efforts to die this way failed he came back feeling a total failure. As he put it he could not even succeed in killing himself. All his doctors had, in his view failed to get him better because he was such a hopeless case, he reasoned.
A short period of hospitalisation followed with medication and cognitive behaviour therapy he got better and all his pains and aches went away. He had misled his doctors. His doctors had missed a major depressive disorder.
Happily, because he sought another opinion he is now well! There is nothing wrong with another opinion.
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Note: The results are not exact but very close to the actual.
