Learning to trust Doctors

[FayeM567]

Trigger Warning Contents of thread might upset some.




I am terrible for not trusting what my GP tells me. Every time he tells me i'm fine i'm convinced he's missed something or he's not taking me seriously. I think it's because I was misdiagnosed by a GP once (not my current one) and it turned out to be a serious illness. I think that incident is partly at the heart of my Health Anxiety. Do other people experience this and have any tips on how to have a little faith as it were?

[PokerFace]

Being misdiagnosed would make it really hard to trust doctors again! I'm so sorry to hear that happened to you!

If you find it hard to trust doctors, when you go and if you still have the symptoms a week or so later and can't get it out your head that he's misdiagnosed you, would seeking out a second opinion be something you'd want to do?

You could book an appointment with a different doctor and if they say the same thing, it's all good. Or find a doctor you really like who's good with you and keep going back to see him/her and that would eventually build up your trust.

Like with any trust issue it's gonna be hard at first and even after a second opinion the doubts will be there, the doubts come hand in hand with Health Anxiety but must be magnified by 1000 because of being previously misdiagnosed, but I really hope you manage to make your way through it! x

[FayeM567]

Thanks for the reply! Yeah, a second opinion is probably the best bet. But, the misdiagnosis makes it harder for me I think. It was for Meningitis, I was taken to the Doctors when a small part of the rash was appearing on my back, but, was told it was nothing and that I should get in a cold bath, only to be rushed to the Emergency Room the next day when I was covered in the rash and already arresting. My partner's father went to the GP and was told he only had piles and by the time he was actually diagnosed with Bowel Cancer it was too late and he passed away. In a rational state I know Doctors are well trained professionals and are right 99.9% of the time, but, I think with two such big screw ups so close to home it makes me dubious sometimes.

[Laura123]

Try thinking along the lines of ow they screwed up twice with you the chances of it happening again are almost zero. It's hard I know where you are coming from x

[JoannaS]

I don't think I will ever trust doctors, no matter how experienced they might be. This lack of trust was triggered by my father being misdiagnosed and ended up dying a year later from bowel cancer. I also found out recently that a friend of mine's mother had been to her GP with chest pains, numbness and pain in her arm and was turned away. The next day she was rushed to hospital with a heart attack!! What is wrong with these doctors?! I think I could do a better job than some of them!

[DylanR]

I don't think I will ever trust doctors, no matter how experienced they might be. This lack of trust was triggered by my father being misdiagnosed and ended up dying a year later from bowel cancer. I also found out recently that a friend of mine's mother had been to her GP with chest pains, numbness and pain in her arm and was turned away. The next day she was rushed to hospital with a heart attack!! What is wrong with these doctors?! I think I could do a better job than some of them!

I wouldn't post stuff like that on a Health Anxiety forum . You'll just end up scaring people even if you mean well :)

[JoannaS]

Ooops sorry, wasn't thinking. What I mean is that I understand what Faye's going through as I've had similar experiences as her with my family. I'm sure we will learn to trust again one day and so far after all the trips I've taken down to the doc's (there have been too many to count!), they've always been right in their diagnosis of me and I've never actually had anything sinister to worry about. I always assume the worst though! :blush:

[FayeM567]

I'm sorry too. It probably isn't the best idea to post these sort of stories in an anxiety forum. But, at the same time I think experiences like this can play a big role in feeding into anxiety and maybe it would be constructive to help over come them.

[lo89]

My mistrust of doctors stems from a misdiagnosis in my family also.
Then again, they have correctly diagnosed everyone else!
My mum is very good friends with a gp and I always get her to diagnose me after seeing my own doctor - if they give me a different diagnosis i go back to my own gp, otherwise i am quite happy to believe that i am probably not going to die within the next few weeks ...

[DylanR]

We all mean well on this forum , sometimes we just say the wrong thing at the wrong time . I have done that many a time! :D

[robin321]

The thing is that Dr's make hundreds of decisions a week. 99.9% of the time they are right. And it is very important to be right, because they can actually lose their license if they are wrong!
Anyway, as with anything, you can never be right 100% of the time. So there will be times, albeit very rare, where they may miss things.
But those are rare! Very rare. The problem with anxiety, and health anxiety in particular, is we overestimate the probability of them being wrong, and underestimate the probability that they are right.

Anxiety makes this worse, because anxiety and trigger symptoms. Or at least make them worse. This is because your mind is paying attention to it.

You need to learn to live with what the Dr says. As others have said, it is ok to get a second opinion but it shouldn't be the automatic response.

[fozzy is crying]

The thing is that Dr's make hundreds of decisions a week. 99.9% of the time they are right. And it is very important to be right, because they can actually lose their license if they are wrong!
Anyway, as with anything, you can never be right 100% of the time. So there will be times, albeit very rare, where they may miss things.
But those are rare! Very rare. The problem with anxiety, and health anxiety in particular, is we overestimate the probability of them being wrong, and underestimate the probability that they are right.

Anxiety makes this worse, because anxiety and trigger symptoms. Or at least make them worse. This is because your mind is paying attention to it.

You need to learn to live with what the Dr says. As others have said, it is ok to get a second opinion but it shouldn't be the automatic response.
What if the second opinion is the wrong one? Unless the second opinion person is unique and is always 100% right.

If you have to keep getting another opinion obviously you have no trust in your Doctor and should find another one.

I have good cause to mistrust Doctors having lost several loved ones due to bad Doctors and one I had years ago if I had followed his advice would have been in a wheel chair paralised for the last 25 years. My current Doctor of over 20 years is a Saint and he always goes the extra mile. Even when he is 100% right he still offers to settle my mind a follow up with a consultant.

It seems a very common problem with mental health to not listen when a Doctor tells you everything is OK as then if you believe what they say it does not feed your anxiety. It is a fact that some long term suffers have to have something to worry about and move from symptom to symptom to find something else that they think is fatal.

Similarly with medication. I discuss and get this resolved with my Doctor, not with Google or others as what is good for one person is bad for another, even down to dosage. If I took to heart 1% of 1% said about medication on these forums I would have to be sectioned with worry. I take quite a large mix of drugs and have done for years with no problems having worked out with my GP and consultants what is right for me both for mental and physical healthy problems.

Gordon

[justina]

Unfortunately I do not always trust doctors, my father was extremely misdiagnosed by several doctors, at one point he was told "it is extremely unlikely that you have a serious illness" and a few weeks later the MRI showed cancer and metastases in almost all his vital organs...he had been seeing doctors for at least three years before the MRI. He died 8 months after the MRI.
Do I have to say that this, and his very painful death, has caused my health anxiety...

But I also must say that my father did not search for any info on his own, as far as I know. He was not very well informed, which should be ok, you should'nt have to be well informed to survive... but to try to be, as we all are here, surely does help...

---------- Post added at 20:37 ---------- Previous post was at 20:31 ----------

I'm sorry if I upset anyone here, I realize that it may not be a good idea to write about this experience here, but a significant difference as I said is that my father really did not look for any information, or a second opinion or anything. HA sufferers have a completely different behaviour and probably would not end up the way my father did.

[nomorepanic]

Faye - this thread has upset a member with HA so could I please ask that you add to the title a warning that it may be a trigger or upsetting for some people.

Thanks

[almamatters]

Anxiety makes it hard for us to trust our doctors, I am constantly looking for reassurance time and time again from mine, but they are highly trained and professional and usually if they are concerned will refer for relevant tests etc. I am struggling with this topic at the moment so wanted to comment.

[fozzy is crying]

Anxiety makes it hard for us to trust our doctors, I am constantly looking for reassurance time and time again from mine, but they are highly trained and professional and usually if they are concerned will refer for relevant tests etc. I am struggling with this topic at the moment so wanted to comment.
:bighug1::bighug1::bighug1::bighug1:

[FayeM567]

Ofcourse, i'll do that right now. I'm very sorry to whoever this topic upset. I posted this thread because it's something i'm trying to overcome right now. At the time I thought background into my personal life which I believe to be the cause of the mistrust was relevant. As, I thought other posters might have had similar experiences and might have tips on how to try and overcome this problem. But, I can see how this might be triggering for some members and i'll try to be more careful what I post from now on.

Edit: It won't seem to let me edit the title, but, i've put a trigger warning at the start of my original post.

[nomorepanic]

Thanks Faye.

They didn't mean any offence by it