Surgeon General’s Warning: Medical Fundamentalism Can Be Hazardous to Your Health
In some doctor’s offices there’s a false binary where you’re either a good patient or a bad patient. But I’m neither. I’m a human being with faults and feelings and fragile health, and classifying me as one of these two kinds of patients is going to result in low-quality care every time.
It’s medical fundamentalism, if you will, and it’s pretty common.
Hi, if this is your first time here, I’m Emily, and my anxiety likes to overthink everything, including the latest exchange I had with my primary doctor.
I’m trying to be easier on myself these days, but it’s a struggle when I’m constantly beating myself up for not seeing this shit coming.
For example: a while back my levothyroxine dosage was adjusted based on lab results alone.
As the one swallowing these pills, I typically prefer being asked how I’m doing at my current dose along with any doctor’s recommendation for changes. But medical fundamentalism dictates that if my labs return a specific result—no matter how small or insignificant the change—my dosage must be adjusted.
For the medical fundamentalist, this means no patient input required. Further discussion pursued by the patient equals bad patient. I instantly and instinctively understood this after my fibromyalgia misdiagnosis all those years ago and stopped complying with the bullshit…until I didn’t.
That’s what happened a few months ago. My Synthroid (levothyroxine) prescription for acquired hypothyroidism was changed to 88 micrograms from 100 micrograms by my primary doctor’s NP—without my input.
I should have probably raised a stink then, but I had more pressing health concerns and let it go.
At my next appointment, my primary physician said “I probably wouldn’t have done that, but it’s fine. Technically she’s right.”
They were showing me who they were, but I ignored it. Not my fault, but also kinda my fault.
At that point my lizard brain was all “Danger, Will Robinson!” and instead of acknowledging the false binary and dealing with it, I convinced myself the distress I felt was all about the increased disability and biopsies and more potential cancer—that it had fuckall to do with my primary care physician dismissing me. I haven’t decided if this is a good excuse yet, but: I was trying to process too many something elses. I put this something else aside.
Side note: some days I really miss the ability to multitask.
So, yeah. It’s my nature to want to be right, which is why my knee-jerk reaction was to think of all the ways the office had dropped the ball. (They are numerous, though when taken individually most seemed insignificant.) But when my lizard brain had a chance to stop being reactive, I found what matters more lying there in the rubble: I expect doctors and nurses to recognize my humanity and my agency.
My decision to find a new primary care physician might have been reactive initially.
However.
After careful consideration, I still plan to leave fundamentalism behind and channel my inner Indigo Girl. Because the less I seek my source for some definitive, the closer I am to fine.