Comment by ajross | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ajross | Hacker News Reader

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> Now here we are in 2023, I have had long covid for almost 3 years and cardiologists are now admitting they are wrong. This article is pretty telling on the dismissive behavior and the truth catching up to them.

I think this is being too demanding of doctors. Their opinion changed because the science changed. Discovery and understanding simply takes time. Practicing doctors aren't scientists, they aren't charged with the responsibility for discovering new disorders and treating them correctly on a per-patient basis. Their job is simply to understand the best available consensus about disorders and treat their patients accordingly. And... it sounds like your doctor did exactly that.

And it surely sucks terribly that the understanding was wrong. But that's not really the fault of your doctor. No one could have treated you better at the time except via dumb luck. It's OK to accuse them of being an asshole about it, but not really about being "wrong" so much.

If being taken seriously is too demanding, then I will continue to do so.

My story I hope shows this exact sentiment mentioned in this article:

> “It’s important to acknowledge that these patients are suffering,” Anagnostopoulos says. “Many of them are young and unaccustomed to being sick or held back in any way from what they want to do. They often feel they haven’t been taken seriously. And what they want to know is that the doctor sitting with them is developing a plan for improvement.”

I think I agree with you there. But being unsympathetic and being wrong are two different states, and it's important to distinguish the two. The doctor did the "right" thing according to the understanding of the time, they were just a jerk about it. And that's being a bad doctor, but it's not delivering "incorrect" treatment.

It's basically a converse take to the "You're not wrong, you're just an asshole" meme.

Cardiologists aren't exactly known for their bedside-manner. Also I did present these reputable journals this article alluded to:

> As the COVID-19 pandemic was getting underway in early 2020, doctors in Wuhan, China, began to report that many patients hospitalized with the disease had cardiac injuries. Heart attacks were frequent, especially in patients with underlying risk factors, and there were numerous cases of myocarditis, which occurs when the heart’s muscle layers become inflamed. Roughly a quarter of patients with severe COVID-19 had elevated blood levels of troponin, a protein marker for cardiac damage.

Still was dismissive of covid having any effect on cardiovascular. But you can only learn so much in 60 minutes over 3 months right?

Again, that's misstating the science. No one could "learn" about cardiovascular effects of covid in 2021 because there was simply no consensus understanding.

"Doctors report many patients [...]" framing is true of all sorts of nonsense, all the time (including about covid! Hydroxychloroquine was being boosted by the same kind of anecdotal evidence). That's... just not how medicine works. How do you know which anecdotes are nonsense and which are correct? You do the science. And they did. But not in time for a lot of people, and yes, that's awful.

This is what they call "patient-led" nowadays. It isn't misstating.

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