Do Doctors mis-diagonise or miss out any symptoms?

[kingkong]

Hi all,
Most of us have have difficult times with Dr. Google.
Is it possible at all that doctors can miss some symptoms and come to incorrect conclusions? Say, the disease is there, and they say its not? That would be worse - right?
I guess the map of medicine will guide them to make the correct diagnosis. But what are the odds?

For example, some of you who might have read Richard Feynman's books might have come across an incident in his life, where he diagonised the symptoms of his girlfriend (think his wife later) correctly, where as the medical community was "waiting" for experts to come and have a look at her?

Thanks for reading.

[chrissie1951]

Hiya,
Nowadays I try never to visit DR Google as he has given me many sleepless nights in the past.
I too have often thought that the Dr was wrong and that I had something serious. After all, DRs are human so it is possible in theory that they could make a mistake, but when you think how many patients they see, I'd say it only happens very rarely.
I'm lucky I have a brilliant GP that I feel I can say anything to, so I usually tell him what I think I am suffering from and he tells me why I'm not.
But it is easy to be rational sometimes and I know there have been times when I have been convinced he's made a mistake, but I'm still here!!
Hope this helps,
Chrissie

[bettykitten]

Obviously sometimes doctors do make mistakes but it is rare. If you think how many patients they see in a day (my own GP sees about a hundred a day!) and how many GPs there are in the country... We only ever hear aboout the mistakes they make, never about the good work they do in diagnosing and treating us. On the whole, they do a great job.

[eva82]

:ohmy: yeah probably shouldn't have read that last post... That's one of my biggest fears!!!

[milanio]

Hmm not to sure that was the best advice to post...

[swanlinnet]

Thank you King Kong. A fascinating post. And such an important topic.

I do know medical conditions are sometimes "missed" . For example, Meningitis has been known to be "missed".

But what is important is to distinguish between "Missed" and "Misdiagnosed".

For instance, it is important to understand that when, say, Meningitis is "missed" by a doctor the doctor has not "misdiagnosed" but, rather, has completely "missed" it.

A Misdiagnosis, on the other hand, is when a doctor says you have, for example, a swollen gall bladder when, in fact, the gall bladder is not. In the instance of a Misdiagnosis, there is no empirical evidence whereas in the instance of a doctor "missing" something there is.

Vince:)

[Keith]

The human body is like a machine it's so complicated there can be many problems that display the same symptoms but if you use logically thinking Doctors rarely make mistakes. I read every 4 months about 1 misdiagnoses and I read every day about a correct diagnoses. If you think a Doctor has misdiagnosed you, do something about it. Go to another one, go to the hospital where it is illegal for them to turn you away, in the UK.

[happycarrot]

While misdiagnoses do happen, I think what's more likely to happen is as HA sufferers, we sometimes have trouble trusting doctors. We may still worry even when the doctor tells us that we don't have any serious illnesses. I think that if this is what you're thinking, the best thing to do is to explain to the doctor that you suffer from HA and ask him or her to explain why you don't have whatever illness that you're worried about. The doctor will hopefully tell you how your symptoms or test results don't match the condition you're worried about. If your doctor won't take the time to explain your diagnoses to you, I would find another doctor who will.

[miss sparkle]

Hmm not to sure that was the best advice to post...

LOL, my thoughts exactly!!:wacko::weep:

[kingkong]

Thanks for all your replies friends.
It was great to hear about your opinions.
Vince, you have captured what exactly was in my mind.
bettykitten, yes I see your point.

I will give you the reason why I posted this in the first place.
I think there is some kind of goal seeking or answer seeking mechanism in the mind. It automatically sees what it wants to see. this might sound philosophical, but I dont know how else to put it.

January, I had a review with the consultant following my November episode.
I was about to say "yes" for the surgery. My review was on the 17th January, I was thinking which way to go.

But few days before the review, I came across the concept of Senstivity and specificity applied to Bayes theorem. I came across the fact that even for high sensitive ( 95%) and high specifity (99%), the actual test results can be accurate to as low as 50%. I did not understand it from a clinical statistics perspective as its beyond my area of understanding. So I wasnt really sure how to benchmark the test results. However, it was backed by a CT scan and kinda convinced myself.

Then, I saw some disturbing news articles in metro ( the free paper) ( like incorrect surgery , leading to damage of the liver, a case of a lucky woman, a case of a not so lucky woman etc etc etc) all in a row and almost everyday.

So in this case, google alone was not the culprit.
I wasnt sure, if the things I was seeing and reading was purely coincidental, or something was guiding me.

Sorry about the long post by the way.

[Danii]

I always try to comfort myself by thinking this. Many Doctors make good money, and had to work hard to get to become a doctor. If a doctor doesnt do his job correctly, and misses something then there is a chance of him being sued, and never being able to practice again, or of him losing his job and or reputation.


That doesnt always help, maybe you could try going to someone else too, but personally ive been to about 5 different doctors in the past 2 months and they all said the same thing. Maybe it would also calm your mind to know that most severe or life threatening illnesses are not easy to misdiagnose, and that Dr google is often wrong.

I go to a pulmonologist who was the head of the intensive care unit at a major hospital for 25 years. He gave me advice and told me things which I otherwise beleived from google.