Doctor’s Advice

There’s a phenomenon I have noticed since I got here that drives me a little crazy at times. It’s that of lay medical advice … not to friends and family from friends and family but to doctors from friends and family. Yes, people tell me all the time what illness I or another person has and educate me about the illness as if I had no experience whatsoever with health, illness, or medicine.

Here is the most recent example of this: a neighbor brought in her little girl today with an itchy skin rash. It was characteristic of fleas, as was the history. We talked about fumigating and treating the itching and I told the mom I’d come by the house later with some medicine since the dad was out of work and there wasn’t any money. As he typically does, Angel came with me to find the house. As we were chatting, the mom told Angel about the itching and the bites. He offered up that it was probably a heat rash but then quickly changed his mind and said that it was probably scabies. He and his unit, back when he was in the army, had suffered an itchy rash and it was scabies. He said rather definitively, “you know what that is? I bet it’s scabies.” He didn’t say, “that sounds like scabies; what do you think, Kate, could it be scabies?" or “Are you sure it's fleas; why don’t you think it’s scabies?” We weren’t looking for a new diagnosis. I'd already told him the child has fleas and we were just dropping off a medicine. It seemed so strange to me (though no longer unfamiliar) that he was offering up suggestions as if I weren't there. As if we were a group of friends hanging out, speculating on a medical condition, regretting that there was no doctor amongst us. I cut in and said casually, “no, it’s not scabies because that bite has a different look to it” and he said, “or maybe it’s ---- (some insect I either haven’t heard of or don’t know the Spanish name for), those itch a lot; more than fleas.” I was even more frustrated. I wanted to say, “Angel, I studied this stuff. Why guess at what it could be when I already let you both know what it was?”. When I confirmed with her about the product she needed to use to kill the fleas he said, “and that will work to kill whatever it is anyway.” Augghhh!

So then we got home and I laid down since I wasn’t feeling very good. I’d started feeling sick yesterday with diarrhea (as usual) and felt feverish yesterday, this morning, and again in the evening tonight. I’d already started my amoeba medicine but was waiting for my Tylenol to kick in. Angel came and got me for dinner but I just wasn’t hungry. I sat with the family but told them I wasn’t feeling well - feverish and chilled. Angel said, “that’s because you worked so hard in the garden yesterday. You aren’t used to it like we are.” I said, “well, I actually I think I’ve got the amoebas again since I have diarrhea and feel achy and feverish”. He said, “ that’s just from working outside yesterday”. Usually, I drop it there but in my irritable, uncomfortable state, I responded that I thought maybe some of the muscle soreness was from working in the garden but the fever probably wasn’t; more likely it was infection. He said, “and tiring yourself in the garden.” It was as comical an exchange as it was frustrating. It’s not the disagreement that got me, and gets me each time this happens --- and it happens a lot --- it was that it seemed to mean absolutely nothing to him that I practice medicine for a living and that illness is my area of “expertise”.

I honestly can’t figure where this comes from. A few times when I’ve told Angel my muscles are sore after a run, he’s told me that is because there is air stuck in the muscle and that someone needs to suck it out. Or Sandra explained to me one day that colic was caused by small spines in a babies skin that need to be rubbed out vigorously and fall onto the table in a pile. I don’t mind the advice or sharing of different healing traditions but I would just expect that they would couch it more like, “well, I’m not sure what doctors believe about muscle pain but we think it comes from air that gets trapped in the muscle” or “from what I’ve seen, colic can be cured if you just get these little spines out of the babies skin”. But it’s never like that, it’s just a definitive statement. Why?