Broken trust. . .

I grew up in a very small town in which our local doctor was not merely our primary care physician but also a counselor, surgeon, and therapist.  He knew the people in his care not as notes on a computer or chart but as the people in the community in which he lived and worked  and worshiped.  He was held in great esteem -- perhaps too much.  There was a time in which physicians were considered demigods with the power to heal, relieve pain, and give answers and direction to the wounded and ailing.  There was a time in which I wanted more than anything to be such a doctor just like him.  As you already know that was not to be.

Sadly, I fear that the physicians I deal with now do not enjoy the same deep respect, affection, and trust that my hometown doc did now some seventy years ago.  It is not because they have personally failed me or given me a wrong diagnosis or caused me suffering.  Rather the problem lies with what medicine has become.  The reality is that no one doctor knows me or my medical condition.  I have a primary care physician whom I have gone to for some 25 years but he does not know me without referencing his screen.  In fact, he rarely looks up from the screen when I see him.  I have various physicians who treat different parts of me and some of them are really quite good but what is missing is one set of eyes that sees everything.

The problem today is that we have lost trust in the whole medical establishment.  The lies that were told during the pandemic, the terrible reality of big pharma, and the medicine that has become less focused on the patient and more on insurance codes and reimbursement have all conspired to make us skeptical of a profession we once regarded as saintly.  No, I am not painting everyone with the broad brush.  I know that there are great physicians, PAs, nurse practioners, nurses, techs, and the like who provide exceptional medical care.  What I am admitting is that the health care industry has become just that -- an industry.

No one presumes that Jeff Bezos created Amazon to make our lives better.  He was in it for the money and he created an amazing company that made him richer than rich.  His wealth boggles the imagination.  You can say the same for most captains of industry.  Maybe I was naive in believing that medicine was somehow immune from the same worship of the almighty dollar.  Maybe it was once not the motivation that it is now.  In any case, if you are smart you will not rely on your physician or insurance company or pharmacy to be your advocate.  You must be your own advocate.  You must take the lead in asking questions and pursing the answers -- whether it is about the diagnosis or the treatment or who pays for it.  Caveat emptor now includes more than used cars.  It includes ourselves as we try to find our way through the maze of medical care and its money trail.  Part of me longs for the old days.  Yeah, I know.  Nobody wants to abandon the advancements that have been made and the diseases now treated that once were a death sentence.  But nobody in their right mind believes that physicians are gods or that the goal of medicine is the needs of the patient.