> It’s worth becoming your own health researcher if no one else can identify the issue.
This is something I have been a big advocate of. I would never claim to know more than a professional nor would I ever give medical advice to another individual.
However, it has helped me plenty of times. I feel like I have been able to ask more important and impactful questions to doctors, and I have been able to push back on some choices that doctors would have made that I think might have been incorrect.
For example, I was almost prescribed a medication. That particular medication might have treated its indicated condition well, but it is known to exacerbate my immune-mediated disease as a side-effect (to clarify, the medication was not for the immune-mediated disease).
When I mentioned it to the NP I was under the care of, she said, "I have never heard that side-effect." Well, she looked into it, and it turns out I was right. Had I not done my research prior to our visit, then I might have been subjugated to changes to a disease that could have been entirely been avoided.
I still think she is a wonderful NP, and no one can know everything.
I even have another account.
I asked an MD about a newer medication for my immune-mediated disease. He said, "I have never heard of that before." After discussing it with him, he did not seem to be interested in trying it. I swapped doctors, mentioned it to the new doctor, and she prescribed it. It's actually the single most effective treatment I have tried since I acquired the disease 7 years ago.
As Schoolhouse Rock once said, "It's great to learn 'cause knowledge is power!"
This is something I have been a big advocate of. I would never claim to know more than a professional nor would I ever give medical advice to another individual.
However, it has helped me plenty of times. I feel like I have been able to ask more important and impactful questions to doctors, and I have been able to push back on some choices that doctors would have made that I think might have been incorrect.
For example, I was almost prescribed a medication. That particular medication might have treated its indicated condition well, but it is known to exacerbate my immune-mediated disease as a side-effect (to clarify, the medication was not for the immune-mediated disease).
When I mentioned it to the NP I was under the care of, she said, "I have never heard that side-effect." Well, she looked into it, and it turns out I was right. Had I not done my research prior to our visit, then I might have been subjugated to changes to a disease that could have been entirely been avoided.
I still think she is a wonderful NP, and no one can know everything.
I even have another account.
I asked an MD about a newer medication for my immune-mediated disease. He said, "I have never heard of that before." After discussing it with him, he did not seem to be interested in trying it. I swapped doctors, mentioned it to the new doctor, and she prescribed it. It's actually the single most effective treatment I have tried since I acquired the disease 7 years ago.
As Schoolhouse Rock once said, "It's great to learn 'cause knowledge is power!"