are physicians really altruistic?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Doctors order unnecessary tests. I know someone who went to see a dr regarding pain in his leg, dr sent him to the ER because of a suspected blood clot, which proved to be false

All that hassle, expense and wait all for nothing
Might as well not have gone to a dr, since the pain is still there

Your example is terrible. Do you really expect 100% of tests to be positive?
At least have valid complaints.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is wrong with wanting to be paid for the work you do? What other field doesn’t get paid for their efforts? Why would someone slave away studying for years and not want to be fairly compensated?

I can think of plenty that don’t get paid enough for their education and efforts.

Doesn’t make it right

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The doctor hating on here is so ridiculous. No one is forcing you to see a doctor or have a doctor. When you have an emergency then just treat yourself since they all suck so much. Again just like any profession most people do the work because they like helping people but they also want to be paid fairly for the training they had to endure and to pay off their +200000 loans and to also support their families. Surgeons spend 7+ years in residency crafting their art. At the end of the day, who cares if they are doing it for altruistic reasons? If they can do the surgery you need then that’s all that matters. I don’t see people asking for plumbers to have altruistic reasons to unclog toilets.

Basically, if you don’t like doctors then don’t see them. No one is forcing you.

I would love to skip the doctors appt for routine prescription refills. Such a waste of money and time.

I guess it’s possible that some doctors are needlessly bringing people in but often the standard of care requires reassessment. They have an ethical and professional responsibility to provide appropriate follow up (not to mention they are risk of being sued should they “just send in a refill” inappropriately.)

Appropriate follow up would be great. I’ve had doctors ask me to come back after 30 days. Makes sense if the meds are causing side effects and I need to shift to something else. I don’t see how anything more than a phone call is necessary if the medicine is working. Why do I need to take time off work for a five minute visit that costs more than $100? What health care is being provided in that scenario? People should be able to sign waivers for low risk medications so they can be bought over the counter.

They are assessing for more than whether you think it’s working okay or not! They may have to check vitals, physical exam, or simply”lay eyes” on the patient. It’s medically appropriate and they deserve to get paid for it. You can probably find a doctor who won’t follow standard of care for follow up visits but I don’t recommend it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Doctors order unnecessary tests. I know someone who went to see a dr regarding pain in his leg, dr sent him to the ER because of a suspected blood clot, which proved to be false

All that hassle, expense and wait all for nothing
Might as well not have gone to a dr, since the pain is still there

Your example is terrible. Do you really expect 100% of tests to be positive?
At least have valid complaints.

The same guy would be first in line filing a lawsuit if the doctor failed to send the patient to the ER and subsequently died due to an undiscovered blood clot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The doctor hating on here is so ridiculous. No one is forcing you to see a doctor or have a doctor. When you have an emergency then just treat yourself since they all suck so much. Again just like any profession most people do the work because they like helping people but they also want to be paid fairly for the training they had to endure and to pay off their +200000 loans and to also support their families. Surgeons spend 7+ years in residency crafting their art. At the end of the day, who cares if they are doing it for altruistic reasons? If they can do the surgery you need then that’s all that matters. I don’t see people asking for plumbers to have altruistic reasons to unclog toilets.

Basically, if you don’t like doctors then don’t see them. No one is forcing you.

I would love to skip the doctors appt for routine prescription refills. Such a waste of money and time.

I guess it’s possible that some doctors are needlessly bringing people in but often the standard of care requires reassessment. They have an ethical and professional responsibility to provide appropriate follow up (not to mention they are risk of being sued should they “just send in a refill” inappropriately.)

Appropriate follow up would be great. I’ve had doctors ask me to come back after 30 days. Makes sense if the meds are causing side effects and I need to shift to something else. I don’t see how anything more than a phone call is necessary if the medicine is working. Why do I need to take time off work for a five minute visit that costs more than $100? What health care is being provided in that scenario? People should be able to sign waivers for low risk medications so they can be bought over the counter.

They are assessing for more than whether you think it’s working okay or not! They may have to check vitals, physical exam, or simply”lay eyes” on the patient. It’s medically appropriate and they deserve to get paid for it. You can probably find a doctor who won’t follow standard of care for follow up visits but I don’t recommend it.

The standard of care is a doctor’s visit every 30 days?? This is why health care is so expensive. We require scripts for meds available OTC in other countries. We could save money and allow doctors to focus on actual health care issues if we made low risk meds (eg birth control) available OTC.

[Anonymous]

Wow, it makes me sad to see how much disinformation people believe.
I am a surgeon, and I feel like the fact that my job allows me to help people and be "altruistic" is the only thing that keeps me going.
I get paid well, but about 1/5 of what my lawyer spouse makes. Most doctors I know do reasonably well, but gone are the times when doctors made a fortune. Of course, there are still a few - private practice orthopedists, concierge docs, etc that do super well, but they are the not the norm.
If you work in a hospital setting, you get paid a salary and there might be some sort of incentive system for how many cases you do. I have no idea what insurance my patients have, and I try to stay out of that mess as much as possible.
For 20 years, I have taken call for 7-10 days a month. Many of those years, I had to sleep in the hospital (trauma call). I definitely work on weekends and holidays - all the time. I deal with people's emergencies constantly. My hospital administration is extremely unsupportive, and constantly putting more and more pressure on all doctors. And my job is full of pressure anyway - despite what many have wrote here, I really care an enormous amount about how my patients do and the care they receive, and doing life/death surgeries is not easy.
I don't complain, and I don't look for appreciation or thanks. I know a lot of other people working get paid much less and have to work holidays, etc. However, I also think reading the opposite is completely unfair. Some surgeons suck - their egos are unacceptable. But there are many surgeons and physicians who cling to the idea that what they are doing is meaningful and altruistic because that is the only thing they have left, and what they can take the most pride in.

[Anonymous]

In general, physicians are relatively to very well compensated for their work. Therefore, they're not altruistic.

End of discussion. This isn't an insult. It's just a statement of fact. That some may derive value from the nature of the work and helping others doesn't make it altruistic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In general, physicians are relatively to very well compensated for their work. Therefore, they're not altruistic.

End of discussion. This isn't an insult. It's just a statement of fact. That some may derive value from the nature of the work and helping others doesn't make it altruistic.

Dh is a surgeon. I do not consider his profession altruistic. He provides a service and gets paid for it like everyone else. He went to school for a long time, had med school loans and a family to support. He does have great job satisfaction. He literally saves lives and gets paid for it.

The patients complaining about follow ups should be glad that you are well enough to feel like you don’t need a follow up. With surgery, you should go to the post op follow up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The doctor hating on here is so ridiculous. No one is forcing you to see a doctor or have a doctor. When you have an emergency then just treat yourself since they all suck so much. Again just like any profession most people do the work because they like helping people but they also want to be paid fairly for the training they had to endure and to pay off their +200000 loans and to also support their families. Surgeons spend 7+ years in residency crafting their art. At the end of the day, who cares if they are doing it for altruistic reasons? If they can do the surgery you need then that’s all that matters. I don’t see people asking for plumbers to have altruistic reasons to unclog toilets.

Basically, if you don’t like doctors then don’t see them. No one is forcing you.

I would love to skip the doctors appt for routine prescription refills. Such a waste of money and time.

I guess it’s possible that some doctors are needlessly bringing people in but often the standard of care requires reassessment. They have an ethical and professional responsibility to provide appropriate follow up (not to mention they are risk of being sued should they “just send in a refill” inappropriately.)

Appropriate follow up would be great. I’ve had doctors ask me to come back after 30 days. Makes sense if the meds are causing side effects and I need to shift to something else. I don’t see how anything more than a phone call is necessary if the medicine is working. Why do I need to take time off work for a five minute visit that costs more than $100? What health care is being provided in that scenario? People should be able to sign waivers for low risk medications so they can be bought over the counter.

They are assessing for more than whether you think it’s working okay or not! They may have to check vitals, physical exam, or simply”lay eyes” on the patient. It’s medically appropriate and they deserve to get paid for it. You can probably find a doctor who won’t follow standard of care for follow up visits but I don’t recommend it.

Some doctors definitely use the follow up to pad the bills. I briefly had one that would require a monthly follow up in person appointment to receive birth control. Even after being on it for years with no side effects or complications(prescribed by a previous physician )They were billing it like an exam but no exam happened a nurse would come out of the room and hand you a script and ask if you had any questions. They refused to do a 90 day supply or send them electronically to the pharmacy . Told my insurance company that I felt it was fraud and never went back.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In general, physicians are relatively to very well compensated for their work. Therefore, they're not altruistic.

End of discussion. This isn't an insult. It's just a statement of fact. That some may derive value from the nature of the work and helping others doesn't make it altruistic.

Dh is a surgeon. I do not consider his profession altruistic. He provides a service and gets paid for it like everyone else. He went to school for a long time, had med school loans and a family to support. He does have great job satisfaction. He literally saves lives and gets paid for it.

The patients complaining about follow ups should be glad that you are well enough to feel like you don’t need a follow up. With surgery, you should go to the post op follow up.

My last hand surgeon told me to take my stitches out myself with a new cuticle scissor and only come back if I had pain in the hand or a fever. They didn’t want to do a follow up otherwise.

[Anonymous]

My daughters 2 year pediatric annual check up was a waste.
My kid was not sick, he told me what I already learnt in high school psychology class
And he used a chart to verify that my child is not obese. As if he needed all those medical school years for that

When we lived abroad the babies got their vaccinations at a clinic, administered by nurses. Here I had to get an appointment with a pediatrician for the same

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My daughters 2 year pediatric annual check up was a waste.
My kid was not sick, he told me what I already learnt in high school psychology class
And he used a chart to verify that my child is not obese. As if he needed all those medical school years for that

When we lived abroad the babies got their vaccinations at a clinic, administered by nurses. Here I had to get an appointment with a pediatrician for the same

Meanwhile at my kids they caught strabismus early with the tracking test. Something that, I, an experienced parent and my physician spouse had not yet caught.
Just because your child is fine does not mean they’re a waste of an appointment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We hold doctors on such high pedestals in this country. My best friend is chief surgeon, and the stories he tells about his docs are truly shocking. He says it is extremely common to have to reprimand his docs who try to get info on their patients' insurance first to see if they'll get a good payment from them. If they have something crappy like medicaid or some other terrible insurance, my friend says docs will initially diagnose a patient with something else that is very closely related to what they know the person has. That way they can avoid having to do surgery on the patient and pass the buck to someone else later who'll get stuck with the patient with crappy insurance. My friend has to routinely make sure that when he is on duty that his docs treat everyone who comes in like they have the same exact insurance so these shenanigans don't go on, but the point here is that how often do things like this go on elsewhere where they don't have chiefs who do ethical jobs who look the other way. How many scummy docs are out there looking to soak as much money as they can out of the system and refuse their services for someone who needs it if they know that the patient's insurance will pay lower rates.

Your friend is sensationalizing a bit. There's always a few bad apples everywhere but doesn't mean that is how doctors are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Doctors order unnecessary tests. I know someone who went to see a dr regarding pain in his leg, dr sent him to the ER because of a suspected blood clot, which proved to be false

All that hassle, expense and wait all for nothing
Might as well not have gone to a dr, since the pain is still there

Your example is terrible. Do you really expect 100% of tests to be positive?
At least have valid complaints.

I know, right?

Some of the people on here are ridiculous.

Doctors are nor miracle workers. They can't x-ray your bodies with their eyes and predict what tests are positives. That and the fact this country is so damn lawsuit happy would make me want to turn away from advising anyone from being in the health profession.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow, it makes me sad to see how much disinformation people believe.
I am a surgeon, and I feel like the fact that my job allows me to help people and be "altruistic" is the only thing that keeps me going.
I get paid well, but about 1/5 of what my lawyer spouse makes. Most doctors I know do reasonably well, but gone are the times when doctors made a fortune. Of course, there are still a few - private practice orthopedists, concierge docs, etc that do super well, but they are the not the norm.
If you work in a hospital setting, you get paid a salary and there might be some sort of incentive system for how many cases you do. I have no idea what insurance my patients have, and I try to stay out of that mess as much as possible.
For 20 years, I have taken call for 7-10 days a month. Many of those years, I had to sleep in the hospital (trauma call). I definitely work on weekends and holidays - all the time. I deal with people's emergencies constantly. My hospital administration is extremely unsupportive, and constantly putting more and more pressure on all doctors. And my job is full of pressure anyway - despite what many have wrote here, I really care an enormous amount about how my patients do and the care they receive, and doing life/death surgeries is not easy.
I don't complain, and I don't look for appreciation or thanks. I know a lot of other people working get paid much less and have to work holidays, etc. However, I also think reading the opposite is completely unfair. Some surgeons suck - their egos are unacceptable. But there are many surgeons and physicians who cling to the idea that what they are doing is meaningful and altruistic because that is the only thing they have left, and what they can take the most pride in.

Some of us still appreciate you and the work of other doctors. I don't hold doctors to the altruistic high bar since that seems unreasonable. If they happen to be, then great. But doctors are here to render a service and as long as they do that well, that's all I can ask for.