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If you were certain your doctor gave you a wrong diagnosis would you confront him/her about it?

What if you felt that the diagnosis your doctor provided was not accurate, yet your doctor did not recommend performing sufficient medical test to determine what was truly wrong with you? Would you confront him/her?
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Marked as Best! October 16, 2009 03:48 AM
Nope. Go find another doctor. Do not pass go, do not collect $200.00. Do brush the dust from your heels as go.

Unless you can *prove* that their action has caused harm that would otherwise not have happened organically, you have no basis for legal action. Even if you were not interested in legal action, going back to them and telling them that they misdiagnosed you won't make them better doctors. Even hearing it from a colleague whom they respect might make no impact.

Finding a doctor or doctors with whom you can work as a team is the key. Doctors are human, too. Sometimes they miss diagnoses - sometimes for years - but if they are good team-mates, they will *listen* to you and pay attention and persist until an answer is found. If they stop listening, it's time to find someone who will.

It's like any team or any work situation - if you can not work together successfully as a team, it's time to interview someone new or supplement by adding team members to take a lead position..
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October 16, 2009 02:39 AM
Of course! People seem to forget that your doctor works for YOU,not the other way around.They don't pay you to heal yourself,you pay them!
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October 16, 2009 03:13 AM
I would because if you are right and he is wrong, you will not be misdiagnosed at that could end up horribly and plus if you are wrong and he is right you will at least learn a little bit and be further educated.
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October 16, 2009 07:23 PM
Yes, you should, simply because it could be detrimental to other patients if he keeps making the same mistake and misdiagnosing the same condition. It could even be life threatening.

There was a magazine show on television once with a report about a woman who almost died because her doctor told her she had terminal cancer and needed chemo. She did not need chemo, and the chemo itself almost killed her. When she was dying of chemo poisoning, the doctor in the hospital told her she didn't have cancer, and never did. It took her years to recover her health, and then she only recovered it partially.

If you can live with yourself, knowing that this could happen to someone else and possibly kill them, then by all means, keep your mouth shut. But the very fact that you are asking this question leads me to believe that you would care very much.
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October 16, 2009 09:23 PM
Thats the time to get a second opinion. Go to another doctor and get a fresh diagnosis. Any Doctor will agree that this is your right as a patient so its not a problem.

Now if you're happier with the care that you're getting from the second doctor, stay with them.

As to confronting the first... well you could have a friendly conversation about why he didn't do something else. But a straightforeward confrontation isn't likely to do anything apart from start a fight.

Legal action will be long and drawn out unless you can actually prove medical negligence.. and personally i'd think you're better just moving on
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October 17, 2009 12:54 PM
First, I would get a second opinion from another doctor I trusted, and then go back to the first doctor and ask him his opinion of the second diagnosis if it were different from his. I certainly wouldn't accuse him of being wrong, because many ailments have similar symptoms. Then I would ask for a referral to at least one specialist in that field before agreeing to any treatments, and if he refused I probably would not doctor with him anymore. I'd also do some research online on reputable medical websites because I've always had an interest in health and medicine and like to be an informed consumer, especially when it comes to health care.
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