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50 Times Doctors Didn’t Know What To Say To A Patient’s Ridiculous Self-Diagnosis
Many of us have been there... Lost down a dramatic rabbit hole of late-night Google searches, prompted by a headache or pain that just won't quit. One minute, we're calmly checking our symptoms. The next, we're having a panic attack and mentally drawing up our last wishes - convinced we've got a fatal case of some rare disease, and have months, if not days, left to live.
Thanks to the internet, it would seem like a medical degree is no longer needed to make a diagnosis. Armed with WebMD, MayoClinic, TikTok, and a false sense of confidence, ordinary "experts" believe they have it all figured out. But often, it's this very determination that leads to hilarious, and sometimes disastrous, results.
Someone once asked, "What was the MOST incorrect self-diagnosis you've encountered in your practice?" and judging by the answers, the real doctors out there have seen it all… From a patient who was convinced they had a bee in their eye, to another who claimed they'd had 20 heart attacks.
Bored Panda has put together a compilation of the best of the worst self-diagnosis cases doctors have witnessed. While some are funny, others are quite the opposite. All are a reminder that Dr. Google isn't always right, and it's advisable to seek expert advice IRL when it comes to your health.
We also unpack some stats, and the dangers of deciding that your own opinion trumps a doctor’s. You’ll find that info between the images.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
I've had a patient claim that amputations run in his family.
He said that was the only reason he needed both legs taken off above the knee. He was adamant that it was not actually due to his uncontrolled diabetes, his enormous and continual sugar intake, his refusal to use insulin, or his refusal of treatment for the giant infected wounds on both feet.
Edit: If you are here to make a remark about how "no one runs in his family," please be aware that we are currently experiencing unusually high call volume, so please remain on the line and your comment will be read by the next available representative.
Earonn - 3 months ago
Fantastic edit. Diabetes isn't just because lack of exercise etc. Did you know that you can get gestational diabetes, i.e. through pregnancy? And that it often goes away after the child is born, but sometimes stays? Yeah, if you want a baby, first check if you can afford insulin.
Börje Strömming 3 months ago
No worries, insulin isnt that expensive. Except in one country….
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Suby 3 months ago
Type 2 diabetes definitely has a strong genetic component, and in a lot of cases, it can't be prevented entirely, but it can be managed with diet, exercise, and medication. How people refuse to do so boggles my mind. I've had it for over a decade, and I follow a strict regimen to stay healthy.
Remi (He/Him) 3 months ago
Type 1 is also probably partially genetic as it's much more common in some populations like Finns than others
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Lil be lil 3 months ago
Maybe amputation is a family feature much like everyone in the family wears a red cap and this is how they are identified. Don't criticize.
Uncle Schmickle 2 months ago
He may have been correct IF uncontrolled diabetes and stupidity " runs in the family ".
Dogcat vet (retired) 3 months ago
Walmart store brand is about 40 dollars a bottle last I checked (can use for dogs whose owners couldn't afford the pet versions).
Kelly H. Wilder 3 months ago
Our pastor's son has juvenile diabetes induced by COVID.
Load More Replies...It's often faster and cheaper to just check our symptoms online than to pay a visit to a qualified medical professional. And if you’re guilty of doing that, you’re not alone… A 2020 survey revealed that 80% of respondents had used the internet for a health-related search that year.
According to Research2Guidance, a company that specializes in market research for the digital health industry, online symptom checkers can lead to a 5% reduction in general practitioner visits in the U.S. That relates to savings of more than $9.5 billion.
But just because it's convenient and free, does not necessarily mean it's safe - or right. Symptom checkers, self-diagnosis, and the like are often inaccurate and can even cause bigger problems than the one/s you think you have. Mentally and physically…
RELATED:
#2
I was the patient. On the Thursday before Mother's Day in 2009, I was diagnosed with a kidney infection 22 weeks into my pregnancy. The symptoms got progressively worse, and on Mother's Day, google convinced me I had a kidney stone so we went to the ER.
Nope. Just me going into labor four and a half months early.
(Side note: had the kid the next day. He's six now. He spent 238 days in the NICU before coming home.).
Ray Ceeya (RayCeeYa) 3 months ago
She got d**n lucky and I'm glad it turned out the way it did.
Fat Harry (Oi / You) 3 months ago
That's ~22 weeks. Wow, that's about as early as premature babies can survive.
CatD 2 months ago
My husband was born at 21 weeks in 1963. He was born at Washington Memorial Hospital which is probably why he survived. His mom had septicemia and kidney failure. They called him a "fetus".
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Lighting Llama 3 months ago (edited)
My sister and I (identical twins) were about two months premature. I’m not sure how long we stayed in the NICU for. But we fought hard. We just celebrated our 30th birthday this year. What’s crazy is my son weighed almost an entire pound more (7lbs 14oz) than my sister and I did when we were born.
Huddo's sister 2 months ago
I wasn't premature but I was only 6lb 1/2oz. My mum is tiny though.
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Papa 3 months ago
My grandson was about six weeks premature, and small for that gestational age. He spent a month in the NICU. He's 8 now, and other than a few minor issues he's fine. I hope your son is also.
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Seadog 2 months ago
If you've never been in NICU and have to go, DON"T look around. Stare at the floor going and coming and focus on your little one the entire time you're in there. No one told me this and I looked around as I went in and I'll never get those images out of my head. From that moment on I stared at the floor anytime I couldn't focus on our son. Heartbreaking just doesn't cover it.
Saltypepper 1 month ago
My oldest was born 3 1/2 months early spent 120 days in the NICU and will be 29 on Christmas 🎄 day .
#3
I'm not a doctor, but I am part of an entire family of hypochondriacs. The best I've heard was from my grandpa who was 110% sure he had ovarian cancer after watching The Doctors.
Kristiina Männiste 3 months ago
A family friend was dying from brain cancer and my granduncle had regular bad earaches and hearing loss, so he decided he had brain cancer too. Started to divide his possessions and stuff. Until we finally convinced him to visit his doctor. It was a huge wax buildup. The earaches resolved instantly and he heard like he had not heard in years. Now if someone in our family diagnoses themselves with a serious disease we ask - Is it serious or is it like granduncles brain cancer?
Fat Harry (Oi / You) 3 months ago
Reminds me of Rachel in Friends saying she had Newcastle Disease... which only affects poultry.
"Of the Generation Z adults, 45% don’t have a primary care physician. And 51% of Millennials see a doctor less than once a year. But studies show that the number of adults who self-diagnose on the internet could be close to or well over 50%," notes Etactics, a software development company that has clients in the healthcare industry.
Etactics cites various research to back up this estimate. For example, in 2015, over a third of American adults regularly used the internet for self-diagnosis, as per the National Institutes of Health. But, according to Becker's Hospital Review, by 2018, that figure was up to 44% by 2018. Then, in 2019, PhillyVoice reported on a study that revealed the number could be up to 65%.
"35% of those who used the Internet to determine the medical condition of themselves or someone else didn’t visit a clinician for a diagnosis. And 18% consulted a professional who didn’t agree with their self-diagnosis," reveals Etactics.
#4
Optometrist here. This happened while I was on rotations as a student. The practice was used to seeing patients from rural areas, educated up to highschool, usually some missing teeth. Anyway, this lady was convinced she had a bee in her eye, but it sounded more like "Derrs ahbeein merahh!" I had to leave the room to get the doctor so he could translate. She had floaters.
edit: lots of questions about what floaters are: when the jelly in the back of your eye degenerates down to a liquid you see shadows of the chunks of jelly floating around in the back of your eye. Very common as you get older, even common in some younger people who've played rigorous sports (football, gymnastics, etc). Thanks for all the up-votes everyone! I'm a long-time lurker and this is only my second post =).
Melinda Landis 3 months ago
Uh, I’m missing teeth. Has nothing to do with intelligence. Access to dental care, poverty, age…I’m in my 70s and a bunch of crowns and filled teeth just…gave up. I’m currently going to a dental college to get them taken care of because I can’t afford a $30,000 dental bill. The students and professors are really cool and it’s about a quarter of the cost. Don’t make assumptions about intelligence based on how someone looks.
Laserleader 3 months ago
Ive seen the black spots my whole life, worse when I was younger. It would just appear in my vision field and move slowly a direction. Moving my eye would reset the position, so I could "bounce" them around in my vision like a game for a while until they disappeared a few minutes to a few hours later.
Electra Complex 3 months ago
thanks now i won't be able to stop thinking about chunks of jelly in my eye
Lily bloom 3 months ago
What does the patient's socioeconomic background and accent have to do with this?
Papa 3 months ago
Maybe because someone with a better socioeconomic background would not have believed she had a bee in her eye.
Load More Replies... Lil be lil 3 months ago
They can bounce around in your eye too. I see them mostly outside in daylight and I will think what was that, A bird just flew across my vision???
Kristiina Männiste 3 months ago
I use the floater in my right eye to gauge distance by comparing the size of different distant objects to the size of the floater😅 But I must say that as I got the floater since I was a kid and was never much into sports back then, there must be other causes to floaters too.
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ROSESARERED 2 months ago
I've got one thanks to a virus that had me coughing so bad I'd wet and shut myself...spent hours sitting on the toilet coughing. Also broke a rib..
#5
This happened in med school. I was taking the history of a guy in clinic and I asked about his past medical problems, including if he had had any heart attacks.
He responded, "oh yeah, I've had about 20 of those."
"...you've had 20 heart attacks??"
"Yup"
"Which doctor(s) did you see about them? Do you have a cardiologist?"
"Nah, I never went to a doctor. My wife is a massage therapist, and whenever a heart attack hits, she starts to massage some pressure points and it stops."
"......Uhhhhh, ok......What does it feel like when you have a heart attack?"
"I don't ever remember them. My wife tells me that I fall onto the floor and my arms and legs start jerking. She says it takes about a minute of her massaging before it stops. I then get really confused and tired afterwards, and I can't remember much of anything that happens to me until I take a nice long nap."
The dude was having seizures, and thought that they were heart attacks. They normally stop on their own after a few minutes (at the most), and his wife thought that her massages were curing him.
Vylnce NA 3 months ago
You know better. We've all seen Idiocracy. They have 8 kids.
Load More Replies... Ray Ceeya (RayCeeYa) 3 months ago
I want to know what happened next! What happens when they find out what happens when they get the real story?
Earonn - 3 months ago
They run a few tests - EEG, CT - and then he gets antiepileptics. And those stop the seizures.
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Jenny Smith 2 months ago
Massage therapist here, and for the record not all of us are that dumb…
#6
I was an ER tech for a few years after college in a very ritzy suburb. We'd get a lot of self diagnosis, and just general hypochondriac's. One time a woman came in via ambulance yelling about how her hands were turning blue, and she was worried about her circulation. A nurse, took an alcohol wipe to her hands and her hands magically weren't blue anymore. Turns out she had bought new jeans and didnt wash them before wearing them. I've never seen someone so embarrassed, she practically ran out of the ER.
Fat Harry (Oi / You) 3 months ago
*Would HAVE. Would you say "I OF done this"? No, you'd say "I HAVE done this".
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Seadog 2 months ago
Never wear anything without washing. Especially now with most clothing coming from other countries. You don't now where it's been or what's been on it. A place my sone worked for a while would get cargo containers in and when they'd open the doors, sometimes they'd hear things moving. They'd close the door, make a call and the container would be picked up, never to be seen again. He was never able to get an answer on where it went or what was done to/with the contents.
Elizabeth Lawlis 2 months ago
I had the opposite happen. I had a doctor insist it was my (what he assumed) new jeans. I washed my hands in front of him. No change. He just responded with "it is unusually cold outside" and left it at that. I have circulatory issues due to a heart valve issue. I found out a couple years later.
CatD 2 months ago
Some doctors still think "hysteria" is a valid medical diagnosis.
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Daisy Elle 1 month ago
I was hit by a car and thrown into the road, in the rain. Minor injuries but still taken by ambulance to A & E. Nurses panicked when they managed to get my jeans off - Me pleading 'PLEASE don't cut them off!!!' Alarm bells all over because I had 'lost circulation in my legs and they were blue'..... Nope! Brand new. unwashed Brutus Golds. Ahhh, I loved those jeans!
Susan Teter 3 months ago
This happened to me in jr. high school. Got a new pair of jeans and didn't have time to wash and dry them before school. My biology teacher asked me if I was cold.🥶 I didn't understand what he meant till I used the restroom and washed my hands. I have NEVER bought something and wore it, without washing it first!
Binky Melnik 2 months ago
In fairness, autocorrect often turns plurals into apostrophes. I have NO idea why. Why the hell does it turn “Sundays” into “Sunday’s”? Or any other plural? It makes NO sense unless the dude who was fine-tuning autocorrect is an abject idiot.
Load More Replies..."While educating yourself can be a good thing, it is important to have objective testing," warns Dr. Robert Mordkin, medical director of LetsGetChecked. "One way to do this is with home health testing, which enables better convenience, flexibility and peace of mind."
The expert finds it "unsettling" that over half of U.S. adults turn to Google to learn more about their symptoms. "The fact that it can take weeks or months to see a doctor highlights the need for better solutions to testing, managing and knowing your health," he said.
#7
As a self-diagnosing patient...One day notice a white, hard, jagged object protruding from my back gum. Can't believe I'm having a tooth come in, especially since I'm 23 and had my wisdom teeth taken out years ago. Go to the dentist to get some X-rays annnnd it turns out to be a piece of a tortilla chip.
Nadine Debard 3 months ago
Happened to me, around 30, it was a piece of my wisdom tooth. The densist had to shatter it into pieces because the molar blocked it. Forgot one piece. Never noticed (recovery was quick and not too painful). The MF got out of my gum ten years after.
Artful Penguin 3 months ago
I had a customer whose adult son went to the dentist because he thought he had a popcorn kernel stuck in his teeth. Turns out he had stage 4 bone cancer in his jaw. They gave me 6 months to live. That was 20 years ago and he is still kickin'.
Jenni Wren 3 months ago
Last year, at the age of 49 I started having teething pain. I had gotten a tooth pulled several years ago and slowly over time, the molar that previously had no room to grow in started growing in. It happens.
Roxanne D'souza 3 months ago
I'm 36 currently and just before covid, my left canine tooth chipped by itself. Over the course of a year it kept falling off in pieces until it was all gone. The dentist had me get an X-ray and as she suspected, I had a "new" one coming in. The X-ray also showed that my right canine also had a tooth underneath. At the moment, I'm still missing a tooth on my left side with the new canine fighting for space to grow. Braces would fix this, but I think I'm too old for this.
Kilie 3 weeks ago
I begged my parents when I was younger to get me braces bc I needed them, never happened so now I am 21 with my own adult money and going to the dentist next week to see about doing it now. Also my best friends 42 yr old dad got them for himself. Never too old to take care of yourself, if you want it done then do it. :)
Load More Replies... Kristiina Männiste 3 months ago
But still a good thing to have it removed. I once had to get emergency oral surgery because a piece of the hard shell of a popcorn kernel had gotten stuck in my palate and got infected😅
Nuku Nyara 3 months ago
I had my first wisdom tooth removed at 40, my general dentist recommended that we remove all 4 but the surgeon said we will be only removing one as the others more than likely won't drop due to my age and how high up they are in my skull. It's been 6 years and no sign of the others dropping down 👍🏼
#8
Veterinarian here. Hope you won't find this out of place. I had a client come in several years ago with a dog suffering from flea allergy dermatitis. These dogs have an allergy to flea saliva that causes them to get insanely itchy - primarily around the rear end and base of the tail. This poor little guy had chewed his fur out to the point that his back half was just about completely naked. So there he sits scratching and biting at himself, covered in fleas, several of which I have combed off of him and showed his owner. "Good news," I say. "We can fix this." After explaining the diagnosis, his owner proceeded to tell me how foolish I was - the dog was not itchy because of fleas. He was chewing at himself as a psychological response to the disturbance caused by having his butt shaved by an unknown intruder who must have broken into the house while they were away. I had no response to that other than to agree, that, yes, that must have been very traumatic for him. Ultimately we agreed to treat for the fleas, just in case. Shockingly, the dog got better.
Erin Van Atten 3 months ago
My cat suffers from this. I've been late with flea prevention a couple of times, and had to call the vet practice for a prednisolone shot. Helps her to stop the itching. Had a different vet each time. I'd call and explain, they made sure they would also run an exam on her. And every time, it ended with them confirming she does indeed suffer from flea allergy. I had to switch vets, couldn't deal with that any longer.
EJN 2 months ago
Offhand, this isn't so much self(dog) diagnosis as it is hallucinations on the part of the owner.
Saltypepper 1 month ago
Agree 💯 there should be some kind of test you have to take before you are allowed to have children,or a pet .
Load More Replies... Dogcat vet (retired) 3 months ago
Its very important for a flea allergy pet to use a good fast flea control product. Some of the generic cheapo flea ointments can be very toxic to cats so always make sure the label does not say DO NOT USE ON CATS. Recommend you ask your vet what should be used as the best treatment for your area. Having fast flea control reduces the need for antiitch d***s (some are very expensive too like adequan and cytopoint shots)
Dogcat vet (retired) 3 months ago
And I have had a lot of clients who insist their pet does not have fleas when you are able to comb out fleas and flea feces right in front of them.
Load More Replies... #9
Lady came to the clinic with her 8 month old baby and she was pretty pretty freaked out. Her baby had diarrhea for the last few weeks and wasn't going away. She initially wasn't concerned but then her friend told her that diarrhea is the first sign of AIDS and now she was convinced her baby contracted AIDS.
We quickly ruled that out through their med records and assured her that her baby didn't contract AIDS randomly. As we finished examining the baby it started to cry so we handed it to her mother. Lo and behold she pulls out a baby bottle to get the baby to stop crying....only this baby bottle is red and is filled with Kool-Aid.
We had to explain to her that babies can't handle sugar at that age and that was the cause of the diarrhea. She refused to believe what we said. "I was raised on Kool-Aid and look at me I'm fine".
Man the south side of Chicago is a completely different world.
Edit: Another story from that clinic. A lady came in and after she got off the scale she asked what her weight was at. She ~10 pounds heavier than the previous visit and seemed upset. So I asked her what about her weight was bothering her.
She said she was trying to lose weight but it didn't seem like her diet was working. I casually asked what her diet was thinking she was trying some of the new diets. Her answer was "Bacon". Her friend told her that if she added bacon to all her meals she'd lose weight so she had been eating Bacon 4-5x/day for the last month. She was shocked when she learned that she was doing the exact opposite of what she was supposed to do.
Edit 2: The reason these 2 cases come to mind is because I was shocked by the lack of common knowledge. These people aren't dumb they just didn't know what they were doing was wrong. It's a symptom of poverty and a lack of education. Both patients took the proper step's to correcting their misunderstandings and were admittedly embarrassed.
As far as the race questions go. I now work in a rural, majority white, part of the midwestern U.S with similar levels of poverty/education as the South Side of Chicago and these patients have the same issues. They just don't know.
Adam Zad 3 months ago
Republican Agenda: Keep 'em poor, keep "em sick, keep 'em stupid, and (above all) control the women.
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SummerVeE 3 months ago
Formal education (or lack thereof) doesn't impact a person's ability to be curious, to seek answers and understanding about the world around us. Basic concepts shouldn't be out of reach for anyone to grasp
Nadine Debard 3 months ago
The problem is, if the parents work so much and aren't educated enough to educate their kids (in the sense of interacting with them, making them understand the world, etc.) the kids will probably lack these basic skills. There were studies (one specifically in rats) showing that a poor environment (lack of stimulation) made the rats less able of adapting to their environment. It's probably the same in all mammals, including humans. Some children are really raised in inadequate places, and I blame extreme poverty.
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Seadog 2 months ago
Why does everything have to be about race? Color has no boundaries when it comes to being an idiot or a POS society can do without. Prime example, the house across from my son was a rehab where people could come and go mostly as they pleased. They closed and it became just a normal house. We'd much rather have the rehab then the people that moved in. We never had one bit of trouble out of the rehab people, in fact they were polite and friendly and often helpful if they saw us unloading something heavy. The people in the house now are generally rude and self centered and disturbing well past midnight.
Pam Wilson-Walter 2 months ago
I will say that African decedents brought HERBAL remedies with them. Once they got here they learned what plant provided the same results. STOP saying 'Blacks' are ignorant - they were brought over here and BROUGHT THEIR KNOWLEDGE OF BUILDING, HERBAL remedies AND Cooking TECHIQUES! I'm tired of people 'white washing' history. The Indigenous Peoples had to show you what to eat and how to hunt it and cook it!
Jake Bertz 3 months ago
There was a dude years ago that ate nothing but bacon for a month and lost like 20lbs.
Natasha 2 weeks ago
Atkins diet? No doubt he was lacking in essential vitamins and amino acids.
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Lil be lil 3 months ago
Actually that's not true. Rural poor don't have much access if any to Wi-Fi or to libraries. Soon because of government cuts they may not even have clinics.
Load More Replies...Not everyone agrees. Some believe Googling symptoms can be a good thing, if done right.
"Contrary to popular belief, consumers can typically trust what they find online," writes David Kopp, chief executive officer of Healthline Media. "The three fastest-growing online sources of medical information contain content written or curated by physicians. In addition, reputable government sites like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health are among the most visited on the internet."
#10
Just finished med school, so not too much experience, but had an elderly woman come in the ER with new onset seizure. The patient's daughter was convinced her mother had a brain tumor. On review of the medications, turns out the patient had been out of her Xanax prescription for 4 days, and had a withdrawal seizure.
angelmomoffour62 3 months ago
I didn't know there was such a thing as a withdrawal seizure....
Suby 3 months ago
With a lot of medications, you have to carefully taper off. I ran out of an antidepressant once (and thought I was feeling great, so I didn't refill it right away), and I started getting dizzy and stumbling into the walls as if I was drunk. Not a good look for a first-year teacher. :-)
Billo66 3 months ago
It's horrible. I was on 8mg a day for 7 years and they tapered me back down to 3. Still not fully adjusted. Vivid horrible dreams which of course cause you to awaken in a panic state. Nausea, dizzy, very short of breath. High dose was becxause I have severe anxiety becauseof cancer. I guess they didn't expect me to be around this long lol. Like C'mon man either hurry up and die or we gotta reduce that.
#11
Self-diagnosis? I'm an orthopedic surgeon, so patients are really often unable to diagnose themselves because they don't have the power of MRI or scoping. The most incorrect self diagnosis I've encountered was a patient who believed they broke their hip after a fall when they actually had a 2 inch piece of skateboard lodged into their side they forgot about...yeah.
Nadine Debard 3 months ago (edited)
Well, I pretty much diagnosed myself a broken finger after 30 min excruciating pain despite the ice put on it and the violet-black colour of my finger. What I missed was the torn off ligament on top of that. Edit: spelling
Gia SDP 3 months ago
Did something similar just this year...smashed my toe on a wrought iron coffee table leg and assumed I'd broken it (have broken multiple toes throughout my entire life, I'm 57). Hurt like heck but didn't think much else of it...until 2 weeks later, limping around, my entire leg was on fire and I couldn't put any weight on the leg. The leg hurt WAY worse than the foot. Ended up in emergency care...where they told me not only had I shattered that toe, I'd broken two others and c*****d a foot bone...and from limping for several weeks, I had micro tears all along my leg muscles and pulled tendons and ligaments. Probably won't make that mistake again!
Load More Replies... Tom Hutcherson 3 months ago
How do you space out a 2" piece of skateboard lodged in your side? Must have some fabulous d***s.
cerinamroth 3 months ago
I had an X-ray on my foot at the orthopaedist and they X-rayed the wrong one; not all docs are infallible either! ;-)
Susan Teter 3 months ago
At 41 I had a stress fracture in my left hip. I had to have 3 titanium pins put in my hip. The morning of my surgery, I wrote on my right hip with a sharpie "Other side dummy". The dude prepping me saw it and laughed hysterically.
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CanadianaKa 2 months ago (edited)
There are some that are possible to self-diagnose with proper application of intelligence... I self-diagnosed osteo-arthritis in one of my fingers based on the nodules on the second joint (and y'know, the pain and swelling and all...). Also self-diagnosed bone-spurs in my foot based on appearance and pain (and that they weren't osteo-arthritis nodules since they had the wrong shape and were localized incorrectly). Not a doctor or medical practitioner in any way, just did my research on reputable sites.
Elizabeth Lawlis 2 months ago
diagnosed myself with broken ribs, broken foot, dislocated knee, dislocated shoulder.. but then again, I have a lot of experience with injuries to myself.
#12
My friend went to the ER after hours of complaining of feeling something like bugs crawling on his eye. He had rubbed it and flushed it with water and it was super red and swollen. He thought he was going crazy. The doctor ended up tweezing 6 bot fly larvae from his eyeball. Apparently there are 6000 cases a year or something in the US alone.
joann fielding 3 months ago
Well, I could have done without that particular bit of knowledge as I eat breakfast. My fault for clicking such a headline over my Cheerios. When will I learn? Sigh
Maren Villadsen 3 months ago
8 cases in the US from 2020-2022.. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10743177/ 312 cases globale
Maren Villadsen 3 months ago
Citation Ophthalmomyiasis remains a rare condition with less than 300 cases reported in the last century (internationale) https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Cases-of-ophthalmomyiasis-reported-in-the-United-States-since-1970_tbl1_369227303
Load More Replies...However, Kopp admits that Google should never replace a real doctor's visit. Information gleaned from the internet is only part of the equation, he says, adding that the skill and expertise of the doctor is what matters the most.
The way Google can help is when a patient arrives at their doctor appointment armed with accurate research. "Online medical research can empower people to take control of their health – and help doctors deliver more targeted, more impactful care," Kopp wrote.
#13
A patient came in with what he thought was a rash and the flu. He ended up having necrotizing fasciitis and didn't survive.
Edit: necrotizing fasciitis is pretty much flesh eating bacteria.
Geobugi🇰🇷🇰🇭 3 months ago
Oh come on, how could he have known? That is not something people get on a regluar basis so you can relate.
Seadog 2 months ago
Friend of mine had it. They started by removing the skin from his leg. Next they took the leg. He never left the hospital alive.
CatD 2 months ago
We knew someone who had it. He survived but lost a chunk of abdomen.
Load More Replies... #14
Patient is diagnosed with invasive ductal carcinoma of the breast, confirmed with biopsy. Surgery prepped for two weeks time.
Patient goes to an outside facility, and does a mammogram. Radiologist read states it is benign.
Patient writes an email to her primary doctor (my attending), "PRAYER WORKS. Please find attached report stating I no longer have breast cancer. Please tell Dr. X (Surgeon) that I will be no longer needing surgery."
Cue furious emails to surgeon with sense of impending doom.
TLDR: Mammograms don't pick up everything.
Edit to add: Sorry there is no resolution at this time - this happened last week. The patient's surgeon is now in charge of "counseling" her to change her mind.
Double Edit 2 weeks later: Patient has been convinced to get the surgery.
BookFanatic 3 months ago
Hey, my aunt had breast cancer and is still convinced she beat it because she ate "multiple oranges" every day. TBF, she's 20+ yrs in remission, so who knows?
Yrral Spavit 3 months ago (edited)
"Prayer works" yeah calling BS on that. Had cancer and my response to this was that maybe I'd be more receptive if their god hadn't given it to me in the first place. Of course there is always a comeback and that it was that we are "tested". ???? For what???
TCW Sam Vimes 3 months ago
Religious fanatics will always find a reason to 'explain' their collective insanity
Load More Replies... #15
I used to be a Nursing student, and we had this lovely lady in our ward who thought she had a kidney stone. She had an xray and the xray just caught a glimpse of her lung; turns out she had stage 3 lung cancer. She took it really well, her family were devastated. It was awful breaking the news to them.
If you are going to Google your symptoms, experts say you should be mindful of the words you use. Stick to basic keywords, advises Dr. Nine Shapiro, author of "Hype: A Doctor's Guide to Medical Myths, Exaggerated Claims, and Bad Advice."
Shapiro says that by doing so, you start with the most possibilities and can narrow down to the most probable diagnoses. You should also use medical terms like "abdominal pain" instead of typing in something like "upset tummy." This is more likely to lead you to accurate medical sites instead of a page that'll take you down the wrong road.
That said, if you have serious concerns about your health, the wisest thing to do is go straight to a real, qualified doctor.
#16
I was the person self diagnosing.
I thought I had a really bad muscle spasm.
I actually had cancer.
Oopsie!!
#17
Had a 19yo girl come in asking for antifungal medication because she was convinced she had oral thrush. Her and her boyfriend had Googled her symptoms, and at 19 you're never wrong. When I suggested that perhaps we check an EBV antibody to rule out mono, she looked at me like I was actively drooling on myself and refused, because there was, "No way I can have mono." Eventually I convinced her to have some diagnostic testing done, and sure enough she had mono. I tried to explain that having oral thrush as a 19 year old could possibly be much more concerning than mononucleosis, but she didn't seem to get it.
EDIT: I will give the caveat that if a patient volunteers that they were looking up their symptoms online, I'll always ask them what they think they have and why. This can sometimes give insight to symptoms or concerns they may not have let on about that help me to make a correct diagnosis. Besides, taking an active role in your health is certainly not a bad thing. As long as you're not acting as if I'm some moron, I welcome that kind of discussion.
Ace 3 months ago
Glandular fever, not sure when or why they changed the name. I had it when I was about 20, took about three weeks to clear up.
PepperPuppy 3 months ago
I think mono is just the American name for it isn’t it? It’s still known as glandular fever in Australia.
Load More Replies... Nadine Debard 3 months ago
Agreed. Horrible pain. And I was nearly narcoleptic for eight months.
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Judy Reynolds 3 months ago
I got mono when my daughter was about 8 months old and only took a nap once a week, whether she needed it or not. She started walking about a month later, and both of us were taking naps. It was roughly 2 years before the mono completely went away. It eased at 6 months, though.
#18
Veterinary Technician here.
Twice I have had people worried that their dog's abdomen was "covered in ticks". Turns out both times to be the nipples. One of them stated someone told them to try to burn the "ticks" off. Another one asked why their male dog had nipples and why they had never seen them before.
Another one was a guy that brought his 3 year old beautiful spaniel in because he saw "tapeworms all over his rear end". Dog comes in severely lethargic and with a diaper on (dog also had severe diarrhea). When I pulled back the diaper... maggots. Everywhere. He said he googled a picture of tapeworms and that's what it looked like. Uh, no.
Dog apparently had a small wound near his rear that got infested with maggots and by putting the diaper on, it only exacerbated the problem. Dog ended up passing later that evening after spending hours removing the maggots, shaving hair, and administering every medication we could. We told the guy next time to not Google things and bring in his pets immediately if there is ever anything that seems off. I think he learned his lesson.
Emilu 3 months ago (edited)
Lol at the nipples one, but the poor dog in the second story. I hope the "owner/s" don't ever own another animal.
Auntriarch 3 months ago (edited)
I don't really understand the male nipples one, I mean we know male humans have them, so why not assume dogs do too. (Though I didn't know about horses!)
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Veronica Jean 3 months ago (edited)
I saw both of these as a vet tech. So many people do not realize dogs have nipples. Also had someone bring their animal in saying they had tapeworms. It was maggots. They burrowed all the way from one side of the body to the other. This poor retriever, Bella, had to sit in a tub with hot compresses taking off the crusted infected layer of dead skin and having hydrogen peroxide solutions poured into the holes. So the maggots would burrow out. Three times a day, but she was a trooper and lived.
Robyn Hill 3 months ago
Owner should have been reported for animal a***e. There is no excuse for this level of stupidity. None.
MaxMi 3 months ago
Took a little cat home from holidays when I was 12, showed to my mom happy we had a cat but worried it being a female she would have lots of cats and how to handle them, so mom goes how was I sure she was a female, since she was very little, and I said she had nipples. Mom shock me the new, I had nipples, too. The cat was a male.
#19
Not my story, but my brother in law's. He'd been putting on weight again for a while, and decided to get back into lifting. Gets severe abdominal pain, thinks he tore something. Eventually my sister convinces him to visit his go, who gets him an ultrasound. One look at the ultrasound, and they've got him booked for an MRI that day. Wait here. You shouldn't leave the building. Phones my sister, mostly care free, who then stars freaking out, because she works as a receptionist in a medical clinic. She knows they don't actually fast track you through tests the same day for no reason.
Turns out the reason he wasn't losing weight again was because of the mass roughly the size of an Aussie rules football on his stomach. Doc orders a biopsy, hopefully it's benign. Doc gets the results, consults cancer specialist, and schedules to take it out in two weeks time.
After they get home, cancer doc called them back and says, let's move that up to tomorrow. Turns out it was a really fare form of cancer, that the specialist had to look up the literature on. Extremely fast growing, super rare cancer with a name I can't remember, because it's about twenty letters long.
Eventually they remove a 3kg mass, along with part of his stomach. On chemo for a while, and six month check ups for the rest of his life, but otherwise good.
Sunny side up, it's now real easy for him to lose weight.
Earonn - 3 months ago
That's my big fear: it's hard for me to lose weight, but as a middle aged woman, I never get more than a thyroid test. Otherwise it's "just the menopause". Which, yes, is likely, but if it was something else they'd never find it because no one checks. I could die early, just because doctors see me only as a walking uterus.
Seadog 2 months ago
I've met too many surgeons who need their next house/car payment and will schedule things including organ removals that are 100% unneeded.
Load More Replies... #20
Ooh, can I play? Only a vet, not an R.D. (real doctor) but...
a young couple brought me their young ginger cat, requesting euthanasia because he had cancer. I asked why they thought so. They cited a) the tumours on the margins of his eyelids (which were actually normal pigmentation, or ginger cat "freckles") and b) that there were drops of blood when he jumped into the empty bathtub (which were actually re-hydrated flea dirt falling off the cat onto the wet tub). I talked them out of euthanizing their perfectly healthy cat.
Seadog 2 months ago
Very likely better than people doctors because they don't have to listen to a bunch of BS from the patient. They have to figure out the real problem and treat the real problem.
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Uncle Schmickle 2 months ago
Dr of Veterinary Science is a human Dr but for animals. Have to be better diagnosticians because their patients can't talk.
#21
A lovely healthy 50-something lady patient presented with her best friend because she was unable to walk.
It turns out she had been becoming weaker over the past couple of months and now had been bed-bound for two weeks.
As she talked she waved her hand over her right breast and mentioned something about a problem there. I took a look. She had breast cancer that was so advanced that it was ulcerating through the skin in an area about the size of a small orange. I'll never forget seeing that.
It's such a shame because she was such a lovely lady. We talked for about half an hour and during that I found that she had put it down to a lot of stress overwhelming her life lately to do with her son leaving home and a few other things. She seemed like a spiritual lady, and she was so sensitive and overwhelmed at the time that I had to take things very slow with her. During that 30 minutes I really felt that I connected with her and slowly helped her understand what was actually going on and that the next few weeks would be tough with treatments etc.
This was about a month after I had started as a junior doctor. The next day I got a complaint to my supervisor by the head nurse for taking too long with a patient, plus a whole lot of other made up stuff about being unprofessional etc to make her claim sound better. Had to go to meetings with management etc.
Anyway, the reason the patient couldn't walk was because of high calcium from metastases all through her bones. I treated that and she was able to walk again a few days later. I looked up her file about three months after and she was still alive, on hormone therapy to slow the cancer's progression.
Ge Po 3 months ago
This is one of the reasons I turn up in time for a doctors appointment and don't get frustrated when I first get called in about a half hour later. Especially when that appointment was later in the day. If the doctor cares more about the patient than the time, the doctor will also use a bit more time on me when I need it. Also, there's often some emergency that comes in which they have to deal with and I would prefer them do the same for me when I come in with some emergency going on.
Paige Merlin 3 months ago
I was explaining that to my husband today while we were waiting for our appointment. If you’ve been in waiting rooms long enough you gain an insight, he did say he deferred to my vast experience.
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#22
I'm not a doctor....
So I was at a friends house spending the night. I had fallen asleep and forgot to take my contacts out. I wake up and my eyes were really hurting. I go to the bathroom to take out my contacts. I claw at my left eye and eventually manage to remove the lense. I do the same thing to my right eye, clawing at it trying to remove the lense. Eventually I realise there isn't even a contact lense in my eye, so I freak out thinking it had somehow slid up behind my eye. I claw at my eye even more, digging around for my contact lense. I still didn't find it. A few hours later my eye is driving me crazy and hurts like hell. So I get my parents to take me to a walk in clinic. They basically tell me I'm an idiot and that contact lenses can't go behind your eye, and apparently in my sleep I must have scratched it out of my eye. Also I scratched my eye up so bad it got infected and I went blind in that eye for about a week... Everything is fine now, but now I know not to sleep with contact lenses in.
TLDR; fell asleep with contact lense in, scratched eye really bad, went blind for a week.
Laserleader 3 months ago
It probably was squeezed out while she slept (common problem for continuous noght/day wearers). The fact they dug around enough to damage their own eye is not the contacts fault
Veronica Jean 3 months ago
Contact lenses can most definitely get stuck in the sides of your orbit. Not in the back but on the side where it's hard to see.
Marie BellaDonna 2 months ago
My husband had one get stuck way up behind his eyelid once. He didn't realize it when it happened, but we were at a wave pool earlier that day, and he got smacked straight dead on in the face with a big wave. So he thought it must have happened then. He irritated the héll out of his eyeball until he realized it wasn't there, just like OP. It took like a week to work its way out. And irritated him the whole time, poor guy.
Load More Replies... Suby 3 months ago
For that, you drive straight to the eye doctor's office, urgent care, ER, etc. and make a fool of yourself - anything instead of hurting your eye.
Jessica Bower 3 months ago (edited)
I've done the same thing and even thought it rolled in the back and went to the eye doc. Pain was from all the rubbing and trying to pull my own eye "skin" off...
MaireC 3 months ago
I was 18 and fell asleep on a padded window seat facing the window at a friend's digs in the middle of nowhere in rural Ireland. I woke up to A)thinking there had been a miracle B)A cow staring at me with its nose to the glass. I have never since been so elated, disappointed and had the sh1t scared out of me simultaneously 😁
#23
Not a Dr, but a pharmacist so I hope I'm allowed to play.
Patient had a cold, convinced it was "severe sinusitis" (a bit of a known hypochondriac). Saw Dr, got script for antibiotic. Was convinced she was allergic to every antibiotic tried until all that was left was antibiotics which aren't usually used in URTIs at a sub-therapeutic dose (because she's "very sensitive to medications"). The infection wasn't going away so she took antibiotics for longer and longer. She somehow got her hands on a blood glucose machine and must have had a reading that was slightly low one day because all of a sudden she started buying bags and bags of jelly beans because "the infection is making my blood sugar go dangerously low" (fasting ~4mmol/L, so normal). So she is taking more and more glucose (moved onto the straight glucose powder now) to control the "dumping syndrome" (I don't think she even read the Wiki on that one...) that the infection caused. Symptom of her "dumping syndrome": blood glucose dropping rapidly (because she is on a diet consisting of pretty much solely pure glucose) to "dangerous levels" (~4mmol/L). She is testing her blood glucose on average 20 times a day and taking about 250gm of pure glucose at least (from us) plus supplementing with lollies from the supermarket for some variety.
We've consulted with the Dr. Nobody can convince her otherwise, we've all tried. She's put on ~15kg in the last month or so and will definitely end up with diabetes soon.
Dr made a mistake the other day. In exasperation she said to her (in her 3rd appointment that month) "You should count yourself lucky, there are people far worse than you that can't even get out of bed". Nek minnit, she now gets deliveries because she is so sick she can't get out of bed...
Tl;dr - Lady had a cold is now giving herself diabetes by living on pretty much just simple sugars.
Yrral Spavit 3 months ago
Having a gadget and knowing how to properly use it are two different things.
Load More Replies... #24
Someone thought they had "a strained muscle in their leg" because it locked up and they couldn't bend their knee, then an abscess formed at the top of their leg right at the pelvic bone, and blood/pus started literally *pouring* out, non-stop, for days.
Eventually he came to the doctor's office, then straight to the ER, and had an abscess in his psoas muscle caused by a perforation in his small intestine. Yep. Pretty far off on that guess there, but apparently it happened right after some heavy lifting.
(to be clear for all you gym rats, no, it was not in any way associated with him lifting, it was a result of undiagnosed crohn's disease destroying his intestines).
#25
Had a guy come in for migraines and confidently proclaimed that the severe head trauma he had suffered 1 month prior had nothing to do with it.
Toothless Feline 3 months ago
I think at that point, “trauma” is no longer a strong enough word.
Load More Replies... #26
Patient was dizzy. Patient thought she had a brain tumor. Went to the medical general practitioner. General practitioner thought she had a chronic middle ear infection. Went to the ear, nose and throat physician. ENT diagnosis: pregnancy.
Cameron Kabinoff 2 months ago
We jokingly call my ex’s niece “the tumour” or use the phrase “it’s not a tumour” because my ex-gf’s sister was getting care from the VA. They told her years prior she couldn’t get pregnant because of the meds she was on, so it never occurred to her she could be pregnant. She came into my clinic for a second opinion before the VA went to send her to an oncologist and scheduled surgery. I put up the films from the VA, saw the babys “pearl necklace - that’s what the spinal column looks like, and immediately ran a urine HCG before doing any other diagnostics. It lit up like a christmas tree. Needless to say, in the immortal words of “Ahnold” “it’s not a toomah”.. My ex’s sister gave birth 2 weeks later. Despite no prenatal care until the 9th month and being on all kinds of medication through the pregnancy, the tumour turned out pretty great. She’s around 25 now.
#27
Mom noticed I started getting weirdly easily irritable and attached to her. She figured it was a case of early anxiety or something so she mentioned it to the doctor casually at an appointment. Blood tests outed her as the silly goose she was. Was actually leukemia.
BookFanatic 3 months ago
Good on Mom for noticing and mentioning it to the doc, and good on the doc for proper follow-up!
#28
So I'm a therapist and I work with kids. Worst misdiagnosis was a family with a two week old who was convinced the baby had
1)anxiety- because he cries.
2) autism- little eye contact
3)bipolar disorder- because baby would seem content then angry.
I spent HOURS explaining child development, what these diagnosis mean, how they would present in kids. I provided them with books, hand outs, etc. They insisted on going to see my co-worker and a psychiatrist as I was surely lying to them. Even after meeting with the other two professionals, they still weren't convinced. They requested psych meds from the doc.
Lil be lil 3 months ago
Wish people would stop psychologically diagnosing other people when they are not qualified!!!!! Even 'expert' psychiatrists can be totally wrong!!!! Many girls in the early 50s until the 70s were incorrectly diagnosed by misogynistic 'psychiatrists'.!!! Btw, homosexuality was classified as as a mental disorder back then too. ( Until a consensus of homosexual psychiatrists ) removed (THEMSELVES) from their diagnostic 'bible'.!!! STUPID is not limited to the 'Uneducated'!!! That's the truth and deal with it!!!
Clarke M 3 months ago
If it is autism, it is TikTok. The baby will also have: DID, ADHD, tourette syndrome, and PTSD. This completes The TikTok Five.
Load More Replies... Kelly H. Wilder 3 months ago
Two-week old baby!?! New parent exhaustion + desperation for "early intervention"? At least this means the infant is receiving frequent medical care, and perhaps the parents can, over time, come to receive education and reassurance that will enable them to better trust those medical professionals.
#29
911 calltaker. 9/10 times this is what we get.
One of the best was "MY BABY CAN'T BREATHE!!!! SHE'S DYING AND GASPING! JUST SEND THEM!" .... then proceeds to hang up before I get an address.
Luckily I was already in the process of narrowing down her cell phone by refreshing the signal a few times (leave GPS turned on people!!) so I was 99% certain I had the right house. I start help out that way while I call her back; no answer. So I call the house number we had in previous calls for that address until I get an answer.
When she answers she's perfectly calm and happy asking who it is. When I tell her it's 911 and we got disconnected (no s**t, she hung up), she flips out screaming that I'm wasting time and sends like 10 insults my way. At this point I'm getting tired of it so I tell her there's more than one person here handling her call and we already have paramedics enroute.
At this point she tries to hang up again saying her baby isn't breathing. So I get forceful (AKA still polite but very direct) saying we need to start CPR, she says no need because they're pouring water over her to make her breathe.
Wtf? If she's gasping she's going to inhale the water.
She tries to hang up again and I tell her if she doesn't listen to me then I will make sure the sheriff goes out there (they already were, they respond to most child calls with us) for child endangerment because I'm trying to help save the baby correctly. Now "help me help you".
Now she listens and walks into the room where the baby is screaming loudly. "SEE?! SHE'S NOT BREATHING SHE NEEDS WATER OR SOMETHING!"
Again, I've lost all patience. If the child is screaming then they are breathing. If they aren't having difficulty crying then they are breathing fine. This kid was breathing just fine, just angry. I tell her this and she says the magic words:
"Lady I'm a CNA, I have no idea what you do but I help people."
"Ma'am my training academy to do my job is longer than your CNA training. I don't try to drown people when they cry." And at this point I think I should not have said that...
Luckily the medics made it there by then and she got focused on them. The baby was screaming because they spanked a 3 month old for spitting up.
Stephanie Did It 3 months ago
I really really hope that mother never had another opportunity to hit her infant, ever again.
Toothless Feline 3 months ago
I hope she was never left alone in a room with that child ever again.
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Sam Trudeau 3 months ago
Excessive punishment. Especially for what happened. Tip for new parents: Kiddos can spit-up more commonly when they get shaken around, such as the "throw baby into the air and catch them" game. Found out via baby cousin
Saltypepper 1 month ago
You have got to be kidding spanking a 3 month old for spitting up that's what they doo it not being bad I hope that poor baby got taken away
#30
Man came into the ER in a panic thinking he had incurable skin cancer.
Turns out he had a wart on his foot...
Geobugi🇰🇷🇰🇭 3 months ago
Give me people who think they have a melanoma any time. You worry about it? See a dermatologist. If it is nothing it is easy to to confirm and in most cases it is nothing. But sometimes it is something and i rather find it in time. It develops into terminal very quick and you rather want a Mohs procedure and be ok than getting the news that it is likely to late to do anything. I do not like OPs attitude at all because he likely is no dermatologist and therefore not an expert on skin. It is not allways that obvious and i hope you do not brush off something as a wart when it is not. It is unlikely that the pt in this case is going to see a specialist.
Papa 3 months ago
I spent a great deal of time out in the sun, in southeast Texas, until I was almost 50. I get checked by a dermatologist every year.
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murmelinpaiva 3 months ago
My SIL died from a melanoma on her leg, and it wasn't even black. She had previously had breast cancer as well. Her marriage was very stressful, so there's that.
#31
This is only tangentially related to the topic at hand but gave me great joy at the time, so I thought I'd share.
During my time as an intern, a patient was admitted for anemia (hematocrit of 16) requiring blood transfusions. Turns out that at some point in the past, after she was diagnosed with an in-born error of metabolism, her primary care physician prescribed her vitamin B12 injections (your body requires B12 to make hemoglobin).
Instead of going back for refills after she ran out, however, she headed over to her local pharmacy, bought *vitamin B6* tablets, and proceeded to take *two* per day, and went on to explain how, you know doc, it's the same thing!
Yeah, no.
murmelinpaiva 3 months ago
Double funny! B6 +B6 doesn't = B12. Also pernicious anemia requires B12 treatment by injection because B12 pills are not assimilated by the patient.
#32
**Tl,dr: I think I'm having eye-strain induced headaches. In reality, the bone marrow in 1/3 of my skull had turned necrotic.**
It was the summer of 2008. I was at work with a massive headache. I decided to head home early. Thinking my eyes were acting up again. (I'd suffered from severe light sensitivity since I was 12. This wasn't entirely uncommon.)
In the lobby of the building I pass out as I'm nodding to the security guard. I wake up in the hospital, the doctor is talking with a nurse insisting I get another set of X-rays "There's no way this is right, have a different tech take another set of images." Then he walks out.
I'm asking what's up. No one is explaining anything. I have another set of X-rays done. A bunch of other Scans of which I still don't understand the differences. And eventually the doctor comes in. Still no one has explained anything to me, no matter how much I ask "Wait for the doctor to get back."
Finally the doctor comes in and tells me they're going to need to prep me for surgery. I immediately ask about my eyes. He seems confused. "Did no one tell you what's going on?"
"...umm..."
Doctor gets all upset "You're missing 1/3 of your skull. Or more appropriately, the bone marrow inside the entire right side of your head is necrotic. It's just sitting there between slivers of bone. When's the last time you've been to the dentist?"
"I don't know, 10-15 years ago? I was planning on going next month now that I finally have insurance for the first time."
"Well we're not sure how it is you're alive. But this has been building for at least 10 years. An abscess in your gums has burrowed up into your bone."
A week later, after a bunch of specialists are consulted, I had my teeth, gums, soft palette, and entire right side of my skull drained of fluid and removed. I was awake through most of it, and no amount of pain medication was enough to deal through the worst of it. Everything was replaced by mostly a plastic polymer, with some metal studs to snap everything together.
Edit: My photo-sensitivity issues weren't a related symptom, if you have light sensitivity and get headaches; don't worry. It's normal for photo-sensitive eyes to get headaches in bright light. If you have an abscess though, go to the dentist. No matter how much it costs.
Lily bloom 3 months ago
Is bone marrow not in bones and is not the skull also bone(s?)?
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Kelly Scott 3 months ago
Uh, I'd love to go to a dentist. But, dude, they don't work for free. And they won't work on you unless you can show you can pay them.
Huddo's sister 2 months ago
I was on a waiting list (in Australia) for almost 2 years for public/community dental work. There was an even bigger backlog than normal because of Covid, so when I neared the top, they still didn't have enough dentists to do the work. So I was given vouchers to see a private dentist for the cost of a public one (about $28 iirc). By that time, one of my teeth was so bad they immediately pulled it. I think I got 3 fillings on other teeth and then my vouchers ran out. I went to one appointment after and they didn't really need to do much, so I paid $200+ for pretty much nothing. They were going to book me in for another appointment and I just said I would call back when I knew my schedule. That was more than 12 months ago and I haven't been able to afford to go back, even though I think I need more fillings. Public health in Australia really needs to include dental as a regular thing but I can't see it happening anytime soon.
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Lor 3 months ago
Easy 4 you 2 say. I haven't had dental insurance for over 12 hrs. I need a couple of teeth that need 2 b removed and to b filled. With everything including exrays was almost $2000. Needless to say I never went 2 the dentist (after getting average of cost) and am still in pain so........
Lily bloom 3 months ago
As someone that suffers from strange headaches and also avoided dentists except to remove broken teeth in over a decade, this post is just slightly scary. I thought the family history of cancer was the most probable self diagnosis. Now I'm not so sure
Paige Merlin 3 months ago (edited)
Can I ask why you avoided dentists? I could assume but there are a few possibilities. Pain in the mouth can be down to issues elsewhere in the body so dentists help rule out many things. Also I have had a 2 decade affair with strange headaches which have thankfully been tested heavily and were never tied to my family history of cancer. Bodies can just be weird :(
Load More Replies... Marie BellaDonna 2 months ago
I've had a tooth abscess before, and I have no idea how OP ignored it for that long. I mean, I totally get not having the money to go to the dentist. But at the same time, tooth abscess pain is like no other. There's no WAY I personally could have just lived with it!
Huddo's sister 2 months ago
My sister had a tooth abscess for when a wisdom tooth came through. Thankfully she qualified for a cheap emergency appointment and had the tooth removed, abscess drained and a prescription for antibiotics the day after the pain started (wasn't easy to find somewhere that could do it on a Saturday).
Load More Replies... Earonn - 3 months ago
And this is how a simple dentist visit turns into skull surgery.... Don't blame OP, if they don't have the money, they don't have the money. But what kind of country is okay with this?
ManuelQue 3 months ago
I have the Canadian dental insurance also but none of the treatments I've had have been completely free.
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#33
A girl i know works in ER and not too long ago a college age kid came in around midnight to get tested for herpes. They figured it must have been pretty bad for him to go into the ER, after further investigation the small red dot turned out to be an ingrown hair.
#34
A few months ago I developed a bad sore on my upper outside gum. It hurt, a lot, and so I asked my wife (a former dental assistant) to check it out. She said it looked like an abscessed tooth.
I went in to the dentist the next day. Another dental assistant (with years of experience) took a look and said, yeah, sure looked like an abscess to her. Too bad, it's a root canal. She took some x-rays and left. I'm feeling pretty bad about it now. I thought I took decent care of my teeth, so this kind of blind sided me. I started mentally preparing myself for seemingly inevitable root canal.
The dentist came in. He's normally a pretty funny guy, but this time he was pretty serious. He looks at the X-rays, peers in my mouth for about ten seconds, and then stands up and starts elevating my chair. "Seven to ten days." That's all he said. I'm pretty confused at this point. He laughed at my expression and said, "You have one heck of a canker sore, sir. It'll be gone in 7-10 days. Today's your lucky day."
I've never been so happy to have a canker sore.
SummerVeE 3 months ago
Having to pay $300-$400 for a dental consult and X-rays just to be told it's a canker sore 😐
cerinamroth 3 months ago
Might not have been in the US. Might not have cost a penny.
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PandaGoPanda 3 months ago
That would have frightened the life out of me! Never heard of canker sores but they sound nasty, Googled it and it’s just mouth ulcers, didn’t know Americans had a different word for it.
Seadog 2 months ago
Ulcer is all I've ever heard and I use my tongue to irritate it then rinse with Peridex. Usually gone in a couple days
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#35
Not a doctor (yet), but I work in the ER as a Scribe, so I follow them around all day. We had a lady come in and said "I got crabs". The Doctor asked "have you seen any of them", to which she replies "no, but I can feel them biting me. My husband gave them to me and my kids". At this statement, we were all thinking "what?".
However, it soon became clear that this lady had no idea what crabs actually are. She ended up having a mild rash and was discharged along with her family, but that was quite an interesting self-diagnosis.
Susan Teter 3 months ago
Well, I guess it's a good thing you didn't get mudbugs!
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#36
Had a friend come to me claiming she was surely dying and had colon cancer. She had dark stool, among some other things, the bloody stool being, "the smoking gun." I asked her what she had been taking to help with her stomach pains. She said Pepto-Bismol of course.
I told her to stop taking the Pepto-Bismol, and told her to go see her primary physician about it. Sure enough it was just the Pepto-Bismol.
Nadine Debard 3 months ago
Started panicking one morning. Intense abdominal pain, charcoal-black stool. Was about to call the doctor, and I tried to gather info in my head. What did I eat yesterday? Ah, yes, pasta with cuttlefish ink. Stupid me.
Lady Eowyn 3 months ago
I was worried for a minute when I saw my dog's poop was reddish, then remembered I'd given her a new brand of treat. Which was reddish.
Load More Replies... cerinamroth 3 months ago
My grandma of blessed memory used to pickle her own beetroot and I absolutely adore beetroot. I thought I was starting my period once because my urine looked so red. "Muuuuuuum! I think it's happening!" "Let's a have a gander - oo, maybe. Oh, actually, how much beetroot did grandma give you for lunch?" "She said I could help myself so I had all of it."
Toothless Feline 3 months ago
The Pepto bottle should prominently proclaim, “Your shït will look like tar after you take this,” because people never seem to know.
joann fielding 3 months ago
Actually, it does. It also states your tongue may temporarily have a black look to it.
Load More Replies... BookFanatic 3 months ago
I've done this to myself twice. Once by eating too many carrots and once with too many beets. Convinced I was dying at first...
Auntriarch 3 months ago (edited)
I discovered that too much beetroot makes your wee red, that was an interesting day.
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Gracie Mae 2 months ago
Took my kid to the pediatrician for a regular check up. Just so happened they'd had a bowel movement the night before that was almost lime green. Kid was ecstatic at the new color, Mom was a bit freaked...and that's how I found out that drinking too much grape koolaide will turn your stool that color!
Huddo's sister 2 months ago
My doctor has always warned me before starting iron tablets that it will cause a dark stool and not to worry. Mind you, when my iron dropped even more suddenly, despite taking two tablets a day she did consider it could be bowel cancer or similar. Ordered a bowel check, even though I hadn't noticed any blood. It wasn't until I was having my iron transfusion that I remembered that I am coeliac and that can cause iron absorption issues.
#37
Real story as a 3rd yr med student -- was rotating through a south side Chicago hospital (aka the hood), female patient in her 50s, thought she was pregnant and asked for a pregnancy test, since she was not menstruating for last couple months. Pregnancy test comes back negative, meantime we work up the history of her experiencing all the classic symptoms of menopause. Anyways, when we tried to explain to her that it was menopause, a natural physiological response to aging in females, she got extremely upset. Requested for a repeat pregnancy test, which we obliged to. Once again, results came back negative. Tried explaining to the patient once more what menopause was, however she told us we were making things up to put it pleasantly. When asked what she thought was wrong, her explanation, in her words were as follows:
1) I am pregnant with baby Jesus
2) I need to get a new boyfriend.
We tried one last time to explain the situation, however she stormed out and never came back. True story.
Kristiina Männiste 3 months ago
Well considering that Jesus's father is commonly believed to be God almighty, she will face a significant downgrade if she goes for a human boyfriend next.
Gia SDP 3 months ago
I was never more grateful than when I went through/wrapped up menopause. So glad the monthlies are no more!
Angela C 3 months ago
As someone who doesn't want kids I am very much looking forward to that
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Huddo's sister 2 months ago
Tv makes it seem like the opposite happens a lot. Older (40s-ish) woman thinks menopause is starting but instead it's a surprise pregnancy. I know it does happen, but probably not as much as is portrayed.
#38
While working as a nurse, had a patient who insisted that her abdominal pain was from a surgery she'd had done on her arm. She thought that a staple that had been used to close the wound on her arm had somehow traveled to her abdomen.
Kristiina Männiste 3 months ago
Reads like the title of an Erle Stanley Gardner novel.
Load More Replies... Seadog 2 months ago
abdominal pain following surgery. Friend of mine continued to get worse following an abdominal surgery. His wife took him to Duke where after a single xray they had to give her the bad news that he was dying and there's nothing they can do about it. Idiot surgeon (not at Duke) had left the clamp on the artery to his liver.
Dogcat vet (retired) 3 months ago
Well I could see it happening if she was chewing on her staples after surgery: maybe she needed an E collar
#39
I'm not a doctor, but a medical translator. I was translating for a refugee patient who asked me to tell the doctor that every bone in her face and hands was broken. She was very insistent that this was the case. She also asked the doctor for a full-body beautification surgery and this was at a free clinic.
It was apparent that her face and hands were not broken and when I relayed the information to the doctor he looked very confused. I'm pretty sure the patient was just a bit crazy because they sent her out of there with nothing more than some Motrin.
ManuelQue 3 months ago
He didn't say it to her face nor in her native language.
Load More Replies... #40
Not a doctor but a Physio, had an elderly female patient ask if she should go and have her prostate checked because her father passed away because of prostate cancer at her age. Bless.
cnn57t8278 3 months ago
I had a (male) patient once write in asking for a PAP smear. We’re in a correctional institution, and there’s very little privacy. I look through the patient’s entite chart for relevant information and come up with nothing. So I’m trying to follow-up very quietly with the patient to find out if there’s an intersex situation not in the chart. Patient is *not* understanding my questions and I’m trying to avoid straight-up asking the patient if he has a cervix with everyone around actuvely listening in. Finally an epiphany: “Does it burn when you pee?” Yup! Dear readers, he wanted an STD check and forgot the term, just that it was a 3-letter acronym.
Melissa Hollowell 2 months ago
My high school boyfriend once told me he had abdominal pain and thought he needed to his ovaries checked.
S Bow 3 months ago
Lol, just yesterday my auntie told me my uncle had bloodwork to check for an infected prostrate. I've given up on trying to correct her use of medical terminology.
Load More Replies... #41
Not a medical pro , but I've wrongly self diagnosed myself for 10 years.
Every other day in winter I'd get two headaches a day. Right behind my right eye. They lasted 45 minutes. Tear eyes and stuffy nose ensued. This started when I was eleven and happened every year on the dot. I started going to the doctors and I'd get sinus headache diagnosis. Boom took pills for a month and the headaches would be gone.
So every year I'd wait about a month or two into the headaches I'd go to the doctor and get antibiotics. This went on til I was 19 and I remember the headache that changed me. I was watching a movie at the theatres, and boom i get a headache. This headache was like no other, in less than thirty seconds I was in the most excruciating pain I've experienced. Stabbing behind my right eye. Tears flowing.
We leave the theatre and I can't even drive. My head is in my hands not moving at all. So agitated. I just want to sit there and snap at any advances of help by my gf. Her trying to rub my back I can't take. I need to be left alone and not thinking. Thinking hurts. It lasts 80 minutes of me crying and just sitting there physically not able to move or comprehend speech because of the focus on pain you have.
Thenext day I'm driving and get one. I go to a new Dr and tell him "I get sinus headaches , can I get this and this and I'll be happy to go" something like that. So him being a good Dr. takes the time to go through my symptoms and correctly diagnoses me with Cluster headaches.
All I can say is, cluster headaches. Im lucky and usually get mild headaches. I've only encountered 4 or 5 crippling headaches that is unimaginable. Some people get a cripplING headache every day at the same time every day.
Johnny Gee 3 months ago
I have had cluster headaches for 40 years, usually at the change of seasons (!) but a few years ago I found that breathing pure xygen with a full face mask can cure the headache in 10 to 30 minutes. Only problem is getting a supplier
Huddo's sister 2 months ago
My doctor won't give antibiotics unless your sinus infection causes a high temp for at least three days. Overuse of antibiotics is a serious thing. I have chronic sinusitis, just like my dad and sister. Only thing that can help is using saline nasal spray regularly. I have year round allergies that are contributing to the problem, but even with a steroid nasal spray daily (which helps the other symptoms) my sinuses get blocked.
#42
I had some guy come in the ER in the middle of the night, because he had a pimple on his forehead; he had been prodding at it non-stop, so of course the thing turned reddish.
He just sat there terrified, explaining that "I was on the Internet, and I have no idea why, but then I googled 'head cancer' and saw pictures and they were horrible and I went, that's it, I'm going to the ER!"
Final prescription: do not go to the Internet for symptoms, and stop waking me up because you've got a pimple please.
#43
I was the person self-diagnosing. I thought I had Lyme disease. Nope, just physically crippling depression.
cerinamroth 3 months ago
I had both at one stage. What a ride that was. I hope you're feeling much better these days.
#44
Not a doctor, but my PCP told me that I had a sinus infection when I actually needed a heart transplant. Got my transplant 3 years later. Doing great now.
#45
I had really bad abdominal pain and I thought I had an appendicitis but turns out I was just crazy constipated.
Kelly H. Wilder 3 months ago
I wish people talked about this more. I have chronic constipation, discovered by CT when checking for other issues. I had no idea that it wasn't normal to hurt after eating or that the top of my stomach should not distend and feel like a boulder. This incidental finding, and the 290mcg Linzess I take every evening, has absolutely been a marvel to me. We talk about digestive health from intake to processing (eating to breaking down that food) but we seldom, if ever, discuss the end of the process. That reluctance means people suffer in silence unnecessarily.
Julie Payne 1 month ago
Going through that right now. Severe abdominal pain and throwing up constantly. Have been to the ER twice about it. Every CT says I am constipated. They decided to do a Colonoscopy. I was given bowel prep starting at 6 am two days before the procedure. Followed everything to the letter! Dr comes in after the procedure and tells me it was a poor bowel prep & only thing he could say was he didn’t see a blockage but we need to repeat the colonoscopy. Am now almost a week & a half of no bowel movement! It’s crazy!
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Gracie Mae 2 months ago
been constipated to the point of being in so much pain that I couldn't walk or move. also had appendicitis. Still not sure which was worse
#46
Just a few weeks ago, I had a patient come in for an eye exam. She tells me that her allergies are really bothering her eyes and she just needs her eyeglass prescription tweaked. Her best corrected vision is 20/80 and her retina is a mess- she's got Stargardt's disease (not previously diagnosed). She is going blind and there is nothing we can do to stop it. I want to refer her to a retinal specialist to confirm the diagnosis but she refuses because, "it's just allergies and I just need to prescribe her some drops."
I should also add that her eye were not at all tearing, itching, and there was no inflammation of the conjunctiva at all- not that this would cause your vision to drop to 20/80 even if they were present.
Seadog 2 months ago
I had one doctor prescribe me allergy eye drops ( I really do have allergy issues). A few years later I have to change to another doctor and the first thing she tells me is stop using those and to immediately throw away the Visine A I had, that they'll do ore damage then good. Told me to use Refresh or other similar drops. She must be right, my eye allergies bother me less than they ever have.
#47
I thought I had pancreatic cancer...turns out it was just an infected gallbladder. They removed it and I am 100% fine now...
Nadine Debard 3 months ago
Infected gallbladder can lead to pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer.
#48
Had a patient who was convinced he had contracted syphilis from "immoral conduct". After a long conversation it turned out it was just salt sores from a long period where we on short rations of fresh water and he had been washing his clothes in seawater. He was convinced he'd contracted an STD from self pleasuring and impure thoughts.
#49
Guy came into ED with occipital headache, talking following directions--thought it was a migrane. CT came back subarachnoid hemorrhage but by that time he had worsening lethargy, stopped following commands, intubated. Brought up to NSICU where I believe he passed away the same day
Batwench 3 months ago
Guy arrived and thought he just had a migraine. He actually had a bleed on his brain, he deteriorated rapidly and was moved to intensive care. He did not live to see another sunrise.
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#50
Had one guy come in thought he had a bad pimple or a boil.
Turns out it was a gummy bear.
Lily bloom 3 months ago
Same but I don't think I want the answer to any of them.
Load More Replies... Gracie Mae 2 months ago
afraid to ask where it was that he couldn't tell it was a gummy bear...
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Stephanie Did It 3 months ago
My 3 year old daughter self-diagnosed. Hear me out: She stayed with a babysitter while I worked. The babysitter's kid was a huge fan of the Incredible Hulk TV show. One evening she picked up a penny and unbeknownst to me, clutched it in her tiny hand in her sleep that night. Next morning, I heard her frightened cry and rushed in to check on her. She held out her little green hand and cried, "Mommy, I'm turning INCREDIBLE!"
Margaret Shannon 3 months ago
And now for the flip side: the doctor explained that my rapidly advancing paralysis was a psychiatric problem called “conversion disorder”. My husband , a Ph.D. In United States History hit Google and diagnosed me with Guillain-Barre Syndrome. For three weeks I languished, no treatments, no tests, no specialists. Finally, a socially prominent friend pulled strings and got a neurosurgeon to take a spinal tap. Ph.D. In history for the win!
Stephanie Did It 3 months ago
My 3 year old daughter self-diagnosed. Hear me out: She stayed with a babysitter while I worked. The babysitter's kid was a huge fan of the Incredible Hulk TV show. One evening she picked up a penny and unbeknownst to me, clutched it in her tiny hand in her sleep that night. Next morning, I heard her frightened cry and rushed in to check on her. She held out her little green hand and cried, "Mommy, I'm turning INCREDIBLE!"
Margaret Shannon 3 months ago
And now for the flip side: the doctor explained that my rapidly advancing paralysis was a psychiatric problem called “conversion disorder”. My husband , a Ph.D. In United States History hit Google and diagnosed me with Guillain-Barre Syndrome. For three weeks I languished, no treatments, no tests, no specialists. Finally, a socially prominent friend pulled strings and got a neurosurgeon to take a spinal tap. Ph.D. In history for the win!
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