RE: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] MLUG - DISCUSSION] RE: [MLUG] progress ....???

["Matt Ross" <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

> As I read your diatribe, I am reminded of a saying of one of my
> mentors, "The
> facts are not important." You probably didn't follow his instructions, but
> there's no convincing you of that fact (i.e. The facts are not
> important.)

Were it the case, that would explain initial problems, but not their
complete idiocy that has remained constant throughout every visit I've had
to doctors and other medical professionals. I assure you, however, failure
to follow instructions wasn't the problem. Between myself and my parents, my
compliance with their instructions was neither optional nor haphazard.

> When
> an infectious disease requires a blood test for diagnosis, both
> an acute and
> convalescent sample are generally needed, so a single sample at
> the beginning
> of the illness isn't going to be diagnostic.

Agreed. They went from that test alone, itself in questionable circumstances
given the status of the lab at the time, and went on to diagnose, treat, and
write off the disease.

> You probably didn't
> hear, or you
> didn't want to spend the money for the office visit, that you
> needed to return
> in 2-4 weeks for the repeat blood draw.

I DID return in 1 week, 2 weeks, 4 weeks, 6 weeks, etc. Over the course of
the illness I was even in the hospital overnight where they could have
performed whatever the hell tests they needed to. They never offered, nor
accented to additional tests when we requested them.

> I have had patients that

Ah, that explains it, you're one of them. :-P

> have come back
> to me and stated that I'd told them "so and so," when I knew that
> there was no
> way in the world that I"d said such a thing.

Give the instructions in writing. Most doctors I've been to do this. My
handwriting is actually worse than that of any doctor I know, so I'll leave
off the wisecracks about being able to read it.

> > My PDR at home cleared that up real quick "May cause throat
> irritation or cough".
>
> Regarding the tetracyclines (the class of drugs is generally
> referred to as
> tetracycline antibiotics, not cycline antibiotics (check it out

According to the labels and prescription notes, they gave me Tetracycline,
doxycycline, and monocycline. The PDR treated each as separate but related
drugs. The official term may be "tetracycline's", but the doctors didn't
correct me or even flinch when I called them "cyclines", and have used the
term themselves afterwards. Before someone claims it was confusion, one
asked if it was just tetracycline and another asked about doxycycline. Both
seemed annoyed when I explained the course of treatment involving all three.

> with a google
> search on "tetracycline antibiotics" and "cycline antibiotics."
> The first will
> give you >3000 hits, the second about 30, and half of those are
> "tetra- cycline
> antibiotics." )) causing throat irritation or cough. I don't find
> any reference
> to either throat or cough. The online edition that I just signed

The implication that you didn't have a desk copy handy to refer to would
bother me, but perhaps you're just more net oriented.

> onto to look
> up your claim did show "The following adverse reactions have been
> observed in
> patients receiving tetracyclines:
> Gastrointestinal: anorexia, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea,
> glossitis, dysphagia,
> enterocolitis, and inflammatory lesions (with monilial overgrowth) in the
> anogenital region. Hepatotoxicity has been reported rarely. These
> reactions
> have been caused by both the oral and parenteral administration of
> tetracyclines. Rare instances of esophagitis and esophageal
> ulcerations have
> been reported in patients receiving capsule and tablet forms of
> the drugs in
> the tetracycline class. Most of these patients took medications
> immediately
> before going to bed." I guess that glossitis (inflammation of the

"Take twice daily, one hour prior to or two hours following meals."
Kinda limited me to "immediately before going to bed" or taking them too
close together. There was nothing in the '91 PDR about problems with taking
it right before bedtime, though. I'll assume you were looking at PDR.net, as
this sounds similar to pdrhealth.com, where I was redirected from there.

> tongue) might
> be construed as throat irritation by some, and dysphagia (difficulty
> swallowing) might be considered a throat irritation. Monilial
> overgrowth (oral
> and esophageal growth of the yeast Candida albicans) can cause a
> sore throat,
> but it is usually going to also cause a sore tongue.

"difficult or painful swallowing", "inflammation of the upper digestive
tract", and "throat sores and inflammation" were on the aforementioned
website. I suspect these are what the previous edition referred to as
"throat irritation". As for the cough, it doesn't seem to have made it into
this edition.

http://www.pdrhealth.com/drug_info/rxdrugprofiles/drugs/tet1439.shtml

> > So in short, don't compare yourself to medical doctors. They
> are somewhere
> > between murderers and rapists in the hierarchy of evil
> professions, IMO. I
> > respect several lawyers, but with good reason I don't trust any doctor.
>
> So you screwed up your MCATs and didn't get accepted. What a pity.

Never had any interest in a medical profession. Just had an interest in
getting over illnesses. As a child I was interested in paleontology, then
went into petroleum engineering thinking that it was a related field. It
became clear though that when Petro. broke off of Geo. engineering, it left
the paleontology to the geos, and just called in one when they wanted to
find a new site. I reviewed my standing and decided I was closer to making
my minor a major than I was to becoming a geo engineer, and I had already
taken a year of prereqs at LU and thought that the programming course I took
there was typical.

> Jim Bradley -- Maryville, MO USA

I hope the medical community is better represented in Maryville than in
Jefferson City, Columbia, California, Saint Louis, or Rolla. The medical
community has existed for far longer than I have, so I will assume there is
something more to it than the myth. I suspect Michael explained it best when
he said "Lots of money to be made so clueless hacks
decided to get their degree in it." Despite my snide remark earlier, I will
assume you're not one of the clueless hacks. The fact that you use linux may
be influencing that assumption though. ;-)

Still, the point remains. Consistently multipe doctors have caused harm
rather than good. This is a disturbing and totally unacceptable tendency in
the people we entrust with our health. We can complain about the health
insurance problem, but we haven't even solved the problem of the doctors
themselves.


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