I was reading back through my logs I kept over the past two years of medical appointments and it's so so much more depressing than I actually remember on the daily
Just note after note like: "reported the pain and was told no next steps" "tried to get this inhaler prescription fixed for two months while the office refused to call the pharmacy" "specialist dismissed the possibility of hypoxia" "it turns out it was hypoxia"
The haters can go ahead and live in "never measure anything measurements are bad you are evil if you think about evidence of change over time" land forever. Knowing how to measure things and make change legible both to myself and to others literally saved my life ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
God no one can argue with numbers the way I can though. Sitting in these offices in such severe pain and my stack of research papers and my logs. I am the reason I got care, over and over again. Paying for the wrong tests as a price for getting them to give me the right ones finally. Knowing how to spot bad interpretations of results.
I do not feel that I ever sat in those offices as an actual patient receiving actual guidance and expertise. What would that be like.
@grimalkina It's awful you had to do that, but unfortunately not surprising. It seems shockingly common that people effectively have to be their own doctor and then continuously fight the nominal doctor to get the proper care. I used to have a lot of faith in medicine until I and people I was close to actually had more interaction with doctors.
Perversely, I have an excellent veterinarian who is thoughtful, thorough, well-informed, and always open to discussion, so my cats have gotten much better medical care than most humans I know. I keep trying to figure out how to convince her to expand her practice to great apes. Also she takes it in stride when I show up for appointments with graphs (or food intake, weight, etc.). 😅
