Listening skills

Some of you may recall my recent posts re chest tightness, heart palpitations and breathing problems, and so I just wanted to give an update. I am fine...I don't have a heart problem, or asthma, and I'm not allergic to Mesalamine, (I stopped taking Pentasa for 4 days) because I had to be sure I wasn't allergic to it. What I have found out though is that I have GERD, most likely brought on by smoking e-cigs, which I think I over used.

I will have to find another doctor now though as he clearly wasn't aware of GERD, and sent me home with the probability in my mind that I may die over the weekend from a heart attack! This is my second attempt at finding a doctor where I live, the first one diagnosed Dysentery and pumped me full of antibiobics (twice) when I actually had UC...as I have said before the level of care where I live is not the best.

Looking back on both experiences, I think the main problem is that both doctors jumped to their own conclusions too quickly, before I had even finished recounting my symptoms, which is a basic lack of listening skills.

I wondered what is your doctor like, do you have a good relationship, does he listen, half listen, or never listens?

I have to agree with Guardian. The best thing you can do is be your own doctor and take your doctor along for the ride (with UC anyway). Some doctors listen just to humor you, which might make you feel better but I don't know if it is worth anything in the end. It's not easy to evaluate a doctor. My ex-wife is a nurse and she used to work in this one doctor's office. The doctor she worked for was older, experienced, and every single one of his patients looked up to him like he was God and could do no wrong. She said he was the worst doctor she had ever seen and if the state knew about their infectious control procedures that would have been shut down. She had to quit and go work somewhere else because she couldn't stand it anymore.

Well said! I agree. We better care when we are in drivers seat.

Have you noticed that some of drs will face the computer and enter info typing on the keyboard instead of looking actually looking at us and actually listening? I appreciate the intention to document, but my better drs will actually sit there and face me, taking a few notes - then typing 'em in later...

It's not that they don't care!

They are simply too overwhelmed to be continually emotionally involved. Try seeing 40 people per day who all have a story to tell, and want you to fathom the depths of their suffering. Many people are difficult to manage, others are desperate or confused.

It isn't easy, and the problem is that becoming emotional involved is incredibly draining. Not only that, some decisions are difficult ones, and made impossible when too emotionally involved. There is enormous pressure involved when taking someone's life in your hands. Not many people can do it.

On top of that there is an ever growing spectrum of illnesses that require constant research, for which many simply haven't the time or the energy....

That being said, a balance between 'robot' and human is best. And finding someone who is keen, and able, to learn new things is important. And you are right, they have to be able to listen. How many people are good listeners?

Good luck, and keep trying.

I agree that it is very easy to get tuned out after a while. In a way it is kind of like being a teacher. After so many years for many it just becomes punching the clock in the morning and on the way out. There are so many patients with so many problems that they don't even have the time to be doctors, it's more like, "here's your prescription". I had to pay to have my own microbiome analyzed and that's when I started figuring out a path to treating my disease.

I get where Gary and even Guardian are coming from, tbh. I do get that doctors are overloaded, have to deal with a ton of paperwork, etc. But from my point of view, it makes for a nightmare system that's just horrible to deal with, and which I would never have known about until I was much older if I had not developed a chronic disease in my mid-20s. It's all so utterly impersonal and faceless. I presume at least in the US you get to see the same GI without too many issues, but in the NHS even seeing the same doctor every time is a major struggle. Even if you can manage it for a while, sooner or later bureaucracy or something else gets in the way.

I'm luckier than most in that I have a GP at least who has retained his humanity and is genuinely empathetic. But he can't treat Crohn's, so I'm stuck with the nightmarish NHS hospital system, which means delayed appointments, no one giving the faintest crap whether you attend appointments or not, etc. Now that I've had surgery, I feel like my aftercare has been abandoned; my GI appointment has been delayed by 4 months for the second time in a row, so that's an 8-month delay in total. It's all so demoralising and stressful. Somewhere along the way modern medicine sacrificed its humanity: maybe it's an unavoidable consequence of high-tech, high-pressure medicine: most likely it is unavoidable. Doesn't mean I have to like it.

(And don't get me started on the experiences of being an inpatient.)

One way to find out if you're doc is actually listening to you is, when you mention any specific issue with him, and you're not sure if/or if you strongly doubt he's listening or heard you, follow up with a question like this...

"have any of your other patients has the same issue I just mentioned?????"

Maybe that will help determine if he's listening for the most part or at all.

I remember with my first autoimmune disease the doctors would look you in the face and tell you that there is no known cause and no known cure and then when you say, "Hey I noticed this" they laugh at you and say, "that doesn't have anything to do with it". Huhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh?