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The darker side of being a doctor

282 points · 342 comments · Danhale93

  1. estearum · · focus · HN ↗
    (speaking from US): The reality is we need more doctors. A lot more.

    There's no solution other than training a lot, lot, lot, lot more doctors.

    Their salaries need to be lower, training needs to be cheaper and faster, and we need a lot more of them.

    1. rolisz · · focus · HN ↗
      Are you sure you can find that many more doctors? That they'll be any good?

      Speaking from Romania: here medicine is prestigious. So many parents push their kids towards medicine. There's a glut of newly minted doctors every year, but rumour has it that the quality drops every year. Sure, they pass the exams and residency and what not, but... They're just not into medicine as much.

      Do you want to get treated by such a person?

      This year I had to go to a neurologist. I went to one locally, they dismissed me in 5 minutes, told me to take some vitamins basically. Went to another one in a much bigger city, they talked to me for an hour, ordered a ton of tests.

      Would it help if we get a lot more of the first kind of doctors?

      1. TeMPOraL · · focus · HN ↗
        Hate to be cynical, but going by the stories a doctor in my personal circles tells me, "talked to me for an hour, ordered a ton of tests" could be more about billing the national healthcare fund for many tests, that may not be most useful, but carry best margins for the facility.

        In my country, there's a big feud between cardiologists and radiologists right now, big enough to be a regular topic in national media. Inside sources tell me it has nothing to do with quality of care, and is entirely about the march of technology allowing radiologists to perform some diagnostics that previously required cardiological procedures, and those procedures happened to be the major funding source for the cardiology departments.

        1. estearum · · focus · HN ↗
          Which is why we need more doctors trained more cheaply who are earning less money. They have far too much labor power currently for a role that increasingly can be fulfilled by a pure “technician” style expertise.
          1. nradov · · focus · HN ↗
            You're describing Physician Assistants and Nurse Practitioners.
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