This post has been shared by the AdvoConnection Blog. It was written with a patient-client audience in mind, but might be useful to you, too.
It is provided so you can find it in a search here at myAPHA.org, but you’ll need to link to the original post to read it in its entirety. Find the link to that post at the end of the excerpt.
Yes, Sometimes the Doctor IS Wrong
This topic is very personal. In fact, over the years I have been affected by PTSD (post traumatic stress) because of it. But because it’s so personal, I may be the best person to share this lesson with you. My name is Trisha Torrey. 13 years ago this week, I found a lump on my torso, about the size of a golf ball. A surgeon removed it, it was sent off to the pathology lab for diagnosis, and two weeks later, I was told I had a rare, terminal form of lymphoma, and was given just a few months to live. Over the course of the next three months, additional tests were run – no sign of lymphoma – yet I was told I needed chemo to keep me alive for up to a year. As it turns out – sometimes the doctor is wrong. In fact, statistics are all over the map on the incidence of misdiagnosis. One report says it happens 5% of the time. Others will tell you it happens 44% of the time. But the truth is – when YOU or YOUR LOVED ONE are misdiagnosed – then the stats don’t matter. It was too many times. (Please note – that statement does not say IF you are misdiagnosed; it says WHEN. Because in your lifetime, if you have had 10 illnesses the doctor diagnosed, all statistics say that at least one of them was wrong. Which one was it?) And that is what happened to me. The diagnosis was wrong. I refused the chemo. I have never had any form of treatment. Those statistics reflect at least four things: Someone is diagnosed with the wrong thing, then treated with a treatment that cannot work, and gets sicker or dies. Or someone is diagnosed with the wrong thing, then not treated at all, and gets sicker or dies. Or someone isn’t diagnosed at all (“We can’t find anything wrong with you Mrs. Jones!”) and gets sicker and dies. Or – as was my situation – someone gets diagnosed with something they don’t have, is told they will die, refuses treatment in favor of a second opinion, gets stymied and roadblocked over and over again by the system, perseveres, and eventually learns that not only is there no malignancy, no lymphoma, but 13 years later has never had any form of treatment – yet survives to pen…