Family Physician? MyDoctor.com

From Reagan Reports:

Doctors Shouldn't Consult Wikipedia

By Michael Reagan

Most of us have been in this situation: You visit the doctor's office. Something is wrong but no one is quite sure what it is. Your wife is tired of you moping around the house and complaining. This is why you're now sitting in your BVDs hoping the doctor can figure out what's wrong and make it go away.

The doctor asks a few questions, checks his watch, and says he'll be right back. Up until recently I was sure my doctor was calling the National Institute of Health, online with the Mayo Clinic or sending a quick text to Johns Hopkins to get to the bottom of this Reagan's problem.

Now I know there's a good chance he was checking Wikipedia.

I went to a family practitioner a few years ago, before I found my current (wonderful) family doc, because I was congested, and figured I might be coming down with a chest cold or something. After the obligatory 45 minute wait past my appointment time, I was taken to a small room in the back where I got to sit in the cold for the additional 30 minutes it takes for the nurse(?) to remember to tell the doctor that there is a living body in the room, and she's not just keeping the corpse cool until the morgue van shows up.

So finally, in comes the doctor, all happy and shit because you're making his next mortgage payment on his second house in Tahiti by being sick, and starts to ask you questions; Like, "Where does it hurt". Okay, I get this one. He has to know the general area, because you don't want him sticking something in your throat if yer ass hurts, and vice versa.....

Then he gets to the hard questions: "Can you describe the pain?"
Sure, Doc. It feels something like when you get kicked in the balls by a giraffe on steroids.
"Can you be more specific?"
No problem. Kick him in the balls and say, 'Something like that, but worse.'

So following the above script, the doc comes in and starts asking me questions. As I answer, he's got his iPhone out, and he's fucking typing on it with a little stylus. Now I know one man or woman, (my current doctor is a wonderful lady) can't know every thing about every medical problem out there, but give me a break here. I'm congested, its flu season. Connect the dots, give me Tamiflu, and go make your payment on the new Ferrari.

So me, being of course the subtle person I am, remark: 'Well, hell, Doc. I coulda looked this up on MyDoctor. com and saved myself the office visit.'

His pleasant professional demeanor dropped faster than a priest's britches in a boys locker room.

He put his phone away, put his stethoscope on my chest and back and told me to breathe. (I thought I was breathing. The desire to continue to do so was why I was here in the first place.) I assume at this point he hit the little switch that turned on Barry Manilow in his stethoscope ear buds while pretending to further give a damn about me and my upstart remarks.

Leaves the room without even a handshake, much less a reach around, and after the obligatory 30 minutes it takes for this monumental mental Neanderthal to write 5 words on a tiny little piece of paper and scribble some incomprehensible squiggle on the bottom, because he's too dense to be capable of making a readable word, much less his own signature, the nurse(?) comes in, says "Doctor Somuchshit says you should take this antibiotic 15 times a day, with a gallon of water, and eat something. Preferably bland and tasting of horse dung."

On this particular occasion, it turned out I had bacterial pneumonia. He was treating me for a viral flu. I missed almost two weeks of work, was in the emergency room four or five times, after taking his bullshit horse pills that weren't doing a damn thing for my problem. On the first visit of which the ER doc took a culture, and two days later I was being treated for the bacteria.  I quite literally damn near died before the antibacterial started working, and often wished I would as I gasped for air while every breath felt like stoking a fire in my chest.

But enough about me.

There are some good doctors out there. My current physician is not only honestly concerned, and calls her patients herself to check on them, she always orders lab tests to back up any diagnosis, and has found some medical study programs that either my wife or I qualify for that puts a couple bucks in the bank. Which usually goes to paying for office visits, but I digress....

My point is, like the article linked above says, do a little basic research before you go to the doctor. At least enough to find out if they know what they're talking about without consulting the internet!And any time they're one hundred percent sure of their diagnosis, get a second opinion!