Idiot Patients: “Projection of One’s Inability to Grasp Concepts Beyond Personal Knowledge Horizon”
By: Wisnu
Tags: Medical, Doctors

Been a while, eh? I’m back, pricks. Vanished for a quite while due to… uhh… “unforeseen circumstances”. Now that I’m back (for a brief period only, mind you), I’m going to present another post, displaying my genuine mockery towards certain type of stupidity. Today, it’s about dumb patients. I pity medical staffs who had previously dealt (or currently dealing) with this type of patient.

Let’s start this rant with things that I can recover from my childhood memory. Back then (when I was still wearing white and red uniform to attend school), a certain stereotype about doctors surfaced. There were people who said that, “Doctors were there for the money and they never really wanted patients to get back to being healthy”. In that moment, I assumed that it applies to a subset of people with said profession. Well, my assumption was (and maybe still is) true. You can look up the internet for cases which involves medical staffs pulling scams on patients, but to condemn all medical staffs acting the way those outliers did is outright ridiculous, to say the least.

To make myself clear, the previous paragraph was intended to provide a bigger picture of our society’s view towards medical professionals. Somehow, for some reason, there is an ongoing attempt of initiating revolts against a field of profession that relies purely on scientific studies regarding the human body (and mind, just to be thorough). Instead of directing themselves to the realm of scientific ideas and logical reasonings, those idiot patients claimed that they “have found out about the truth” through conspiracy theories. Few examples are as follows:

· Doctors have found the cure for cancer, they just don’t want to tell you because it will cause them to lose money!

· Vaccines are the cause of autism, the government just doesn’t want you to know!

· Weed is illegal due to the government and medical professionals not wanting to lose money which they gained from their current practices!

· It’s the Jews again!

· (Insert religion name) predicted this back then!

· Any other mumbo-jumbos that might come out of the mouth of a Karen, you name it

For those people, a series of events with 1/1,000,000,000 probability of happening is more likely to be the cause of their current situation compared to “things that mother nature does on daily basis”.

Therefore, these patients tend to seek alternative treatments for the sole purpose of curing their sickness (or anything they assumed to be wrong with their body, pretty much). Mind you, I have nothing against herbal medicines, acupuncture, you name it, under the condition that as much data and information possible regarding those practices are well documented. The researches, the methods, practitioners, results of the treatments, etc. The problem is… well… you know, those alternative treatments tend to give absolutely 0 (zero) fucks about important things that I’ve said to be the condition which must be satisfied. Oh, and regarding possible patients’ condition and possible outcomes of the shady treatment? Managed to summarize them in the form of a table. Here it is:

Note that the term “shady treatment” is used here to describe treatments that don’t base themselves on any researches (yes, I said researches not scientific researches. I had to lower my standards). An example of the previously mentioned shady treatment, is a wacky building made of mostly woods on the side of the street, with curtains covering the windows, displaying a printed image of an open mouth showing the teeth, and written gloriously using huge and eye-catching font above that image is a two word phrase — “AHLI GIGI”. That type of treatments, you know them.

Now back to the patients. Gladfully, the patients that became “better off” usually carried on with their life, walk themselves towards the setting sun, never to be seen again. Now the ones that are heading south are those who are going to become a pain in the ass for our fellow standardized medical practitioners. Those idiots, after an attempt (or multiple attempts) of curing themselves through some bullshit treatments, finally decided to seek help from a doctor. Yes, finally. A doctor, with a medical degree, who were put through hardships to obtain that degree, one of those hardships is being tested by other doctors which are more experienced than him/her.

Anyway, when those idiots meet the doctor, often they didn’t disclose the whole story leading them to where they are currently. Some might mention previous treatments, symptoms, improvements or declines, but rarely the reason of not immediately seeking proper medical assistance itself. Well, I bet we can see why. Consider yourself being an idiot patient with an intelligence level not that far higher than a dolphin (I know it’s hard, but you’re the intelligent one. Warning: you can’t expect a person who’s as smart as a dolphin to place him/herself in that shoes of yours, well, I’m assuming you’re the intelligent one, but… uhh… yea), would you come to someone to ask for help by first telling him/her that he/she is “a bad person and will never fully earn your respect”? Of course not, right? How shameful it is.

Anyway, after consulting an idiot patient, the doctor will give certain diagnosis and maybe some initial prescriptions just to test the condition of the patient. Well, surprise-surprise! Some of these patients fear the “test”, probably because their perception of the word test itself, assuming the doctor is playing “knock-knock, who’s there?” game with those meds, resulting in these idiots not taking any given prescriptions. You can guess where this is going, so I’m going to leave you right there.

Another form of a patient’s idiocy is having the audacity to lecture a doctor about his/her specialty (always remember to distinguish them from the ones who are politely asking questions due to their lack of knowledge, they totally deserve respect to the fullest). Another one is abandoning proper treatments to finally land him/herself on another mumbo-jumbo treatment because the proper treatment “made no sense to them”. The are many forms of stupidity an idiot patient can offer for the rest of the universe to experience. Providing all of them here will result in a scene picturing me unable to enjoy the Saturday night with my beloved ladies.

“Fear of the unknown” is really a major player in those cases. Patients — or people in general with distorted information about reality can do outrageous things. First, this is due to their “knowns” which was distorted in the first placed. The concepts that are ingrained in their minds doesn’t comply with how the universe works. On younger people, these things are usually just a part of growing up, hence resulting in no difficulty of teaching them the idea of renewing own belief. For older people or adults, however, things can turn out differently. It’s fear of the unknown combined with fear of being false. Understandable, yes. Acceptable? A hell huge no (at least for me, tho).

Any field with science as its’ cornerstone requires the involved individuals to put facts above personal beliefs or assumptions. Knowledge is constantly obtained, ideas pop in and out of existence, perception about reality is continuously refined, concepts change as time moves forward. Doctors, at least most of them, are the ones who comply with said requirements. They didn’t get their title from isolating themselves from the world, or constantly refusing any presented scientific facts in medical field. They went through shit trying to grasp it all. Being certified as a doctor is not an epilogue of their journey. They, like anybody else working in scientific fields, are condemned to learn until the day they stop breathing in the air for good. Actions must be carried with full responsibility, errors must be as minimum as possible, and the thought of participating in one’s death is just plain nightmare for them. Giving respect and trust to them is the least a patient can do, which doctors often find just enough to put a peaceful smile on their faces. Be this type of patient just in case you need to go to the doctor.

At least, just don’t become like this one jackass I’ve read about who was:

“Treating his cancer with Budweiser while just blissfully ignoring the Grim Reaper”

Note: …jackass probably dead now, lol