Becoming the Doctor You Never Meant To Be

“Doesn’t diabetes affect the kidneys, Doctor?”, I asked when Dad was at one of his numerous medical appointments.

The Internist stopped and finally looked up from the chart he had been writing in for the last 10 minutes. (I had never seen a physician interview a patient and not make eye contact during the course of the conversation.)

“Well, yes” he slowly replied, recognition of an idea starting to appear in his eyes. “Yes, it can!”

With a renewed enthusiasm, the doctor began reviewing the papers in the folder and he began to hurriedly scribble notes. A decision had been made.

Advocating for Our Loved One

We become a lot of things to the ones we care for and one of the most intimidating areas we have to become conversant in is modern healthcare.

When I was prompting Dad’s internist, it was a way to diplomatically move the doctor towards a form of care that benefited Dad, not just do something that was billable to insurance. I didn’t want to tell the guy his business but after a battery of negative tests to find non-existent bleeding inside Dad, I wasn’t prepared to repeat the whole series again, as proposed by the physician.

(Kidneys produce a hormone that signals bone marrow to make blood cells.)

I will fess up to being a primary care physician (Chiropractic) myself but this conversation was not about who’s diagnostic skill was greater. It was about getting Dad the best available care.

Whenever I engage caregivers about their loved ones, the conversation always comes around to managing our unwieldly healthcare system. I am amazed at the thoroughness of understanding these lay people have of diseases and treatments. Learning the ropes, one crisis at a time, obviously provides individuals with a pretty detailed understanding of physiology and healthcare.

Promoting Yourself

So yes, developing a credible education to adequately advocate for your loved one is possible. Like Rome not being built in a day, education is a process that begins small and grows.

Ask questions of the providers (doctors and nurses). Any and every medical situation warrants your full understanding of what the risks and benefits can be for your charge. In legal terms, this is called informed consent. As a legal representative for your loved one, you must have a handle on things so the best possible decisions can be made.

Embrace the language. Understanding the medical terms is almost as important as understanding the legal language. You do not need to endure formal study but the professionals with whom you interact have a duty to ensure that you develop that knowledge base. If you don’t understand something, ask again and/or ask for resources. Stay tenacious. The language of Latin will appear quite foreign at first but the more you work with medical terms, the better you will become at understanding it.

Keep learning. Besides the teaching resources you have at hand (the doctors and nurses), the Internet can also help. Something as simple as a medical dictionary can work wonders. You won’t become a doctor or nurse this way but it will help with grasping what the healthcare folks are talking about.

One caveat: There is a lot of erroneous healthcare information on the Internet. (Sort of “Well, duh!”) There’s lots of sales pitches, falsities, fantasies, and plenty of outright dangerous claims out there. Look around and find reliable sources that you trust. Ask your healthcare professionals for feedback on sites that they rely upon. (Yes, they still have to look things up too.)

In keeping with that idea, here is a current medical article on dementia. It is written by and for doctors but it also provides some unvarnished truth about the pathologies (there are different types of dementias). Give it a try. You’ve got the dictionary at hand for the tough terms. See what you can do to your understanding of the disease many of us contend with each and every day.

You’ve got this.