How Collapsing Social Infrastructure Led to Everyone Becoming an Internet Medical Expert

[cally]

34. Excellent post and needs wider distribution

I am fortunate and do have medical care but it is the type you describe. Short office visits, one symptom diagnosed at a time, send you to specialists for one symptom. No one doctor takes/has the time to diagnose the cause. My then 21 year old daughter started losing her eyesight with blurred vision. She had cat scans, blood tests, myriad of other tests. She saw multiple doctors. I was told she might be dying with no cause given. Finally her sister and her spent days on the internet diagnosing the cause. She diagnosed herself, went to the doctor and had a test confirming the diagnosis! My other daughter was prescribed pills that damaged her brain.

I don't blame the individual doctors but I do blame the medical establishment. We have a system that does not work for many of us. That's why so many people turn to the Internet and self-help cures.

I'm not an anti-vaxxer. I'm passionate about public health issues but I completely understand the thinking behind this choice.