In the old days, doctors knew their patients and their lives.
They knew the family, they knew the family’s medical history, they went to the weddings, funerals, graduations, christenings, bar mitzvahs.
The doctor was always invited to these events and they knew how much their patients ate, drank and smoked.
Most of them even delivered babies, made house calls, knew where their patients lived and how they lived.
Everything about you was stored in the memory of the doctor….no charts needed.
You knew you were getting the best care because your doctor knew YOU!…
Today? Does your doctor know you?
ANOTHER TRUE STORYTIME!
When my aunt was diagnosed with bladder cancer in her fifties, her doctor told her,
“Eleanor, don’t you ever stop getting mammograms. You have a history of cancer now and therefore we always will take preventive measures to make sure if cancer comes back, we catch it early.”
Well, now Medicare, our government insurance recommends no mammograms after age 75.
But Aunt Ellie ignored that and at age 90, on her annual mammogram, cancer was found.
She went through a total mastectomy having both breasts removed and lived cancer-free to the age of 98.
Well, Nancy Keating, MD, healthcare policymaker and professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School suggests,
“For women with a 10-year life expectancy, I recommend continued mammography screening,” she says. “For those with less than a 10-year life expectancy, I explain that studies suggest that mammography screening is unlikely to find a cancer that would change their life expectancy…”*
I think my aunt would have disagreed. She did not want to die from cancer or suffer through the last stages of cancer.
And she certainly didn’t want to put our family through it either.
Does YOUR doctor know you this well?
Or is your doctor a statistician who looks at life expectancies?
As a physician assistant and like most doctors I know, we think you’re unique.
You are not a statistic but a human being with a lot of people who love you,
a life to live,
a heart full of love,
and wisdom still to be given.
So get your medical records and sit down with your doctor.
If your doctor does not seem interested in you, your parents or grandparents, then find one who does.
This meeting is a game-changer!
As medical care providers, we truly want to partner with you and will show you how easy this is….