Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem is, how do you know when to advocate for yourself? I have zero idea if what the doctor is telling me is accurate or not. I'm not a doctor. This is why people are moving away from main stream medicine, in my opinion.
"do your own research" may get mocked, but it's often the best strategy. You just have to make sure it's the right place, professional guidelines, pubmed, and anyone referencing those is usually best. A good doctor won't have issues discussing something from that kind of source.
For example, I have very weird/non standard genetics when it comes to processing medications, so I've had to learn which classes of drugs I need very small doses of or that I can't take at all. (Some drug classes aren't made in small enough doses for me to take safely). So I have to relay this to doctors and we make our medication decisions accordingly.
Or if you run hot or cold. My body temperature is usually a ~ 96.5, so I'm feeling awful by the time my temp hits 99.5, even though that doesn't register as a problem generally.
Or how I pushed to get a mammogram covered before it is ordinarily because my mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother have all had 3+ rounds of triple-negative breast cancer even though they don't have the BRCA genes: the standard recommendation doesn't fit our family and I am high risk despite not having the standard markers for being so.