Our first readings focused on the way that scientists are created. B. Good's work, focusing on medical students at Harvard, discussed the ways in which doctors are trained to comprehend the world through a very specific lens. So, I find it kind of funny that the NYTimes has mind puzzles that challenge the reader to "think like a doctor".
This one, published on October 1st, is set up like a mystery: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/10/01/think-like-a-doctor-dazed-and-confused/?ref=health&_r=0
The reader is the events as they progressed and the clues (AKA the woman's symptoms). The reader even gets redacted copies of the doctor's notes and video. The readers are to post their diagnoses on the blog once they have come to some conclusion from the story presented.
Is this not kind of weird? Medical mysteries have left the format of documentaries or fictionalized TV series and have become akin to the Sunday crossword puzzle. I'm also starting to wonder why I have this gut reaction that this is "weird". Have I been conditioned to think of medicine as something extremely personal that should only be examined by those who have been trained to "think like doctors"? What do you all think of this?
I thought it was weird when I thought the entire thing was made up with a created patient but then I thought it was even more weird when I realized it was a real person who had actually been taken in to the ER. I'm also struggling to determine why I think this is inappropriate. As a formerly pre-med biology major I loved hearing stories from physicians about various patients and their courses of treatment. Even now that I don't plan on going into medicine I find these stories from friends, family, and professors fascinating. I'm not sure if this comes from a general curiosity and nosiness about others or if it is a direct result of my intellectual interest in medicine. I will say, though, that I don't have a problem with physicians sharing patient experiences with students that may eventually enter the field as doctors. The publication of this case for anyone to see does strike me as weird. Based on this, I would agree with Helen that we have been conditioned to consider medicine as intensely private and only for professional (or pre-professional) eyes.
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