Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

blog.tjcx.me

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 438 posts

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#201

Post by TheRealDunkirk »

jnovek wrote: post #40

“ Medicine has become a three-way negotiation between you, your doctor, and The Algorithm.” This characterization makes it sound like a good thing. In reality, the doctor’s responsibility is being pushed to the patient because they are overbooked in the name of economic efficiency. As a patient with complex, non-specific medical condition, I can tell you how miserable this is. I can’t count on doctors _at all_ to mov…

I have been struggling with what I have come to understand is a very rare neurological condition, which I've had for over a decade, but which became chronic just over a year ago. I liken my process over this last year to being a general contractor of my health, hiring migrants at the Home Depot parking lot for the day.

I've been through 8 doctors now. I've had 4 specialists in different areas tell me that there was nothing they could do for me, and just leave me hanging, without even giving me an idea of what to look at next. The only reason I've been able to get any help was because my wife just happened to stumble on a couple of doctors (who work together) by researching my symptoms online. Luckily, the last two have identified my problem, confirmed the diagnosis, and one of them just operated on my back a week ago.

During this year, I wasted time, health, and money on a surgery I didn't need, and which the specialist who performed it SHOULD have known wouldn't help. I can't help but think that he saw an opportunity to do a surgery, covered by my full-blown, "Cadillac" insurance plan, that might have helped, and he took it.

Now I've had an experimental surgery (i.e., uncovered by insurance), and two trips to California. I figure I'm running about $30,000 out of pocket on this whole fiasco. The good news is that the surgery seems to have been a success, but I won't know for sure for 3 to 6 months. Maybe even a year.

> I can’t count on doctors _at all_ to move the process forward.

My feelings directly echo this. No one in this process is responsible for my overall HEALTH. I'm old enough to remember that it didn't feel like this. Your PCP would have been the "general contractor" several decades ago. Now, all anyone cares about is selling me a service, and then getting paid. And my PCP is notorious for trying to upsell me (per the FA) and get me to do tests and labs that I don't need.

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#202

Post by cma »

lupire wrote: post #105
coryrc wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US, that would be rare.

Pointless nitpick, especially because providers pay referral fees.

"Payment by or to a physician or health care institution solely for referral of a patient is fee splitting and is unethical. Physicians may not accept: Any payment of any kind, from any source for referring a patient other than distributions of a health care organization's revenues as permitted by law."

https://www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/ethics/fee-splittin...

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#203

Post by cute_boi »

matsemann wrote: post #12

Why are dentists so scammy? In Norway I've seen documentaries about them sending the same people to multiple dentists, and some of them receive wildly different advice. Some of that can be ascribed to some being in the school of pro-active, so they want to fix your teeth at the first glance of issues. But in the end, most of the things being quoted were unnecessary. They all seemed very intent on removing wisdom teet…

My dentist also told me to remove wisdom teeth. Its been more than 10 years and it hasn't caused any troubles....

And, the crucial part is the hospital is considered as no 1 hospital in my country.

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#204

Post by noasaservice »

unpythonic wrote: post #165
noasaservice wrote: post #100

The title is wrong: Dentist almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments; Google results of search spam SEO cesspool

If you read through to the bottom, you'll see the article itself is just a call to action for yet another service which the author is starting. It's an ad. Seeing it buried so deep doesn't make me feel that the author has any better intentions than Google itself -- credibility already gone.

Well, yuck. I did completely miss that this was just a shitty advert complaining about other shitty adverts.

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#205

Post by ydant »

bsuvc wrote: post #181
the_only_law wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At what point can I just purchase old medical machinery on eBay and run my own blood tests and stuff.

No need to buy the machinery, unless you really want to. You can order your own tests right now from LabCorp and Quest, through sites like requestatest.

LabCorp and Quest both have their own products for this, too:

https://www.ondemand.labcorp.com/ https://questdirect.questdiagnostics.com/

Which are just a wrapper for asking one of their in-house doctors to prescribe you the test you requested, without a real review of your need or the actual potential benefit for you in doing so. So it technically meets the letter of the government requirements for medical tests, but not necessarily the intention behind restrictions around tests.

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#206

Post by FollowingTheDao »

matsemann wrote: post #12

Why are dentists so scammy? In Norway I've seen documentaries about them sending the same people to multiple dentists, and some of them receive wildly different advice. Some of that can be ascribed to some being in the school of pro-active, so they want to fix your teeth at the first glance of issues. But in the end, most of the things being quoted were unnecessary. They all seemed very intent on removing wisdom teet…

> Why are dentists so scammy?

Why? Capitalism. And I am serious. It is just the need to make a profit that drives them to these places.

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#207

Post by Afforess »

ironmagma wrote: post #128
salsadip wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I‘m really not trying to sound snarky, but - is this the supposedly high quality treatment that U.S. citizens get that is so much more expensive as opposed to the „socialized“ insurance we get in Europe that is cheaper for everybody and supposedly therefore not as good/cutting edge?

Depends on which doctor you are going to. We have some of the world’s best doctors but they might be in hospitals or doing a concierge service. You get what you pay for.

> You get what you pay for.

But you don't... that's the whole problem with the American Healthcare industry!

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#208

Post by erikerikson »

jonhohle wrote: post #109
jnovek wrote: post #40

“ Medicine has become a three-way negotiation between you, your doctor, and The Algorithm.” This characterization makes it sound like a good thing. In reality, the doctor’s responsibility is being pushed to the patient because they are overbooked in the name of economic efficiency. As a patient with complex, non-specific medical condition, I can tell you how miserable this is. I can’t count on doctors _at all_ to mov…

Are there any laws that treat medical providers as fiduciaries? That seems like a minimum bar that insurance companies would want to enforce (at least in the short term when premiums could remain high while treatment cost plummets).

Insurance companies in the U.S. are barred, I think universally and definitely broadly, by state law from being too profitable. The outcome you describe would result in returned premiums or other profit sinks.

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#209

Post by oversocialized »

petesergeant wrote: post #7

> Laser bacterial reduction (LBR) is just one example of the many high-stakes medical decisions Whether or not to drop $400 is not a "high-stakes medical decision". Also, expecting Google to give you high-quality medical advice when your actual, licensed, trained dental hygienest is not is asking a lot of a search engine. Personally I've found sticking "examine.com" on the end of most results to be very useful for an…

No post body was provided.

Re: Google almost convinced me to spend $400 on useless laser treatments

#210

Post by Auracle »

FollowingTheDao wrote: post #196
brimble wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can confirm. They paint people who google symptoms as kooks or as annoying, but you have to if you ever want to get an actual diagnosis and treatment, because doctors and hospitals are, quite often, worse than Google at figuring out WTF is wrong. Do your best not to end up in a hospital without an advocate (friend, relative) watching out for you. They'll fail to treat you at best, then discharge you with a shrug and…

I was misdiagnosed with Bipolar Disorder for 30 years. Turns out it was Neuropsychiatric Lupus. Despite all my pleading to them to look further they never did. I had to teach myself biology and genetics while I was on disability. They missed all the common signs of Lupus; my skin, bad kidneys, etc. I am afraid all this technology is taking away all of our wisdom. Too easy to know things, very hard to understand them.

My dad almost died in the 90s because they couldn't diagnose his lupus.
Post reply on HN