"The medical profession is dangerous"

Thanks to John for finding this one.  Note that it was written by a nurse.

CDC'S JIM JONES BLAME-THE-PATIENT RHETORIC:

  THE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME?

  Clara Valverde RN, BSc

  Aquo Health Professionals Training Team

  formacionsalud@hotmail.com

(excerpt)

Without going into details, one can clearly see that Dr Jones is suffering from the type of chronicity and frustration shown by many doctors who went into medicine with the idea of "curing" ("caring" they leave to nurses so as not to have to involve themselves with those uncomfortable parts of the human being which deal with the patient's own experience of disease). The lineal medical symptom-diagnosis-treatment-cure paradigm is challenged deeply by CFS and this frustration is projected by many doctors onto the patients (Absbring and Navaren 2002, Ware 1999). As Arthur Kleinman  wrote: "The medical profession is dangerous for chronic patients".

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In fact, that was the assessment of one of my doctors of another medical group that has no idea what to do for CFS patients, "they're good on cutting-edge treatments that will get them international headlines, but they have no interest in mundane things like chronic illness that won't get them headlines." 

In discussing this with members of a local support group, they all seconded that opinion: not one CFS patient who has gone to that medical group has been helped.  They all had the same experience I did there, doctors unfamiliar with new research and unwilling to review what the patient provides.  The support group makes a point of steering patients away from that medical group for that reason.  While it's too late to backtrack and stay away from them myself, it's reassuring to know that it's not just me -- the problem is the doctors.

Tags: CFS, medical profession, doctors, nurses, caring, curing, chronic illness