“ 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…
For people that are very good at research, self-advocacy and research is absolutely a night and day difference from just going in to the doctor for 15 minutes and being rushed through the system. If not for that in my own chronic health condition, I'd be on immune suppressants right now vs a much lighter treatment regimen in conjunction with generic/supplements supported in limited academic research abroad (the funding bias in research for patented vs generic/non-patentable treatments is its own topic).
But that's not the majority of people, and far too many think that they are capable of "doing their own research" when they aren't equipped to do so at all.
Particularly when it comes to medicine, that's a dangerous misconception, and Dunning-Kreuger is actively killing people who can't discern between snake oil and a meta-analysis.
So many of the people doctors are dealing with that are Googling ARE idiots who endanger themselves with their 'research.' Which sucks for the people who are actually good researchers and dealing with biases towards self-research.
Though in my experience, typically good doctors very quickly realize you're adequate at research and work with you as a treatment partner, and it's the people like my dad who will fight against actual research efforts in a quest for confirmation bias.