I. Communication - Them vs Us

Some of us don't speak a common language

During a recent patient encounter we were introduced to a (for us) previously unknown substance called "Poly MVA." The patient, having tried and rejected the chemotherapy recommended by an oncologist, said she was taking it to cure her breast cancer.

After some research on the Internet (there is nothing in any of the medical literature about Poly MVA), we found that this is the latest in a long line of "cancer fighting" agents introduced by what we mainstreamers refer to as "quacks".

On the Poly MVA web-page (a pretty fancy place) is a scientific sounding explanation of how Dr. Barnett, working alone (and in secret in his cellar lab?) developed this agent. Its presumed effect is to "protect and restore cellular DNA, disturbances of which are the root cause of all malignancies." (Not a perfect quote, but you get the idea.)

Oh, by the way, a month's supply of Poly MVA can be had for a mere $300! What a bargain!

We are also, at this time, engaged with a friend and former patient in a discussion of whether HIV is really the cause of the AID Syndrome. You can probably guess which side we're on in this debate.

There are a lot of people in the world who don't, for one or another of a thousand reasons, trust or believe their formerly well trusted and slavishly believed physicians. There are many physicians who see this as an epidemic of mass stupidity, and respond as any reasonable person would, by rejecting the patient and his bottle of Poly MVA, or his divergent opinion. The battle, thus joined, has no chance of resolution without serious losses on both sides.

How in the heck did we get into this predicament? Is it possible to fix blame on one or the other of the parties involved? Should we even try to resolve the issues, or is this one of those things we have to live with for the rest of our days together? After all, this has been going on (almost) since the days of Sir William Osler vs the snake oil salesman. So who cares what happens?

For a lot of reasons, we all should care. It is apparent that a huge amount of money is being spent on items of questionable value, and a huge amount of physicians' time lost using (and trying to explain) expensive resources that many patients reject. As an adversary of ours once said, "There are no white hats in this situation!" Responsibility for our problem is to be shared almost equally by the "mainstreamers" and the "rejectors."

Since this is a serious problem, we are going to devote serious time to it, with two (more if needed) column / sections. The first, "How doctors turn off patients", can be reached through the link on this page. The plan is to follow the usual format of our web-site: We can't fix something without knowing how it got broken in the first place.