Okay, I confess, I’m one of those guys who doesn’t have a great deal of confidence in medical doctors. I think it’s partly as a result of working as a lawyer. During the 8 or 9 years I worked full time as a lawyer I never worked in the area of medical malpractice, yet in spite of this I ran into several medical malpractice cases. To a certain extent, I would have been, kind of, the last resort for someone with a medical malpractice case. The last resort because they had already been advised by the lawyers who specialized in medical malpractice that they didn’t have a case. Didn’t have a case not because they weren’t negligently injured by a doctor but because a California Law, MICRA,(Medical Insurance Crisis Reduction Act, I believe, emphasis on Insurance. Like my mom likes to say insurance companies didn’t build those big buildings by paying off claims.) effectively protects doctors from any but the most costly malpractice claims. So in the course of my legal beagle practice, I came across, (I guess I should say they came
across me.) a woman who’s yet to be born baby had been killed during
an amniocentesis, a woman who was sewn up with medical waste inside
after a surgery at county hospital causing her to become severely
infected, a woman who had received a routine injection of some
sedative, which is first supposed to be diluted, undiluted, causing the
flesh on her arm to be eaten away, and a diabetic who had the wrong leg
removed.
I said all that to refer to this from Mark Steyn’s column, in the Israeli news paper Haaretz:
And,
while I am at it, I cannot resist adding a couple of entertaining facts
I have stumbled upon. The first is that you can be diagnosed with
something called an iatrogenic condition. This refers to a state of ill
health or adverse effect caused by medical treatment. Let your
imagination run riot here. Your doctor, in treating you for your
iatrogenic condition could make a mistake, thus causing a second
iatrogenic condition and so on, to the growing detriment of the
patient, but to the unquestionable advantage of the medical profession.The second example is even more fascinating. It has been the subject
of learned articles in medical journals throughout the world, but
originates in the country that also gave the world the Bible, Ogen
melons and the Uzi submachine gun.In 1983, and again in 2000, the Israel Medical Association took industrial action (He means they went on strike. gm)
and applied sanctions in public hospitals, canceling thousands of
outpatient visits and elective operations. Did people – cruelly
deprived of medical treatment – drop in the streets like flies?
Actually, no. The result was a measurably significant drop in the death
rate for the duration of the strike. It seems that medical inactivity
is a sure-fire prophylactic for iatrogenesis.
Anyway, just remember doctors are not God no matter what they tell you.