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Comment by jacobsenscott | Hacker News Reader

Unless doctors can see with their naked eye what's wrong they just give you the boot unless you fight hard, diagnose yourself with google, and demand tests. I used to think doctors got mad at googlers because they would find crazy wrong answers and waste their time. Now I know it is because it reveals their incompetence. I laugh whenever anyone says the US has the "best medical system in the world".

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I had to tell a lung specialist that my shortness of breath, which was being alleviated by antihistamines, might be allergy-related. She literally told me my symptoms were "a mystery" after I had told her that antihistamines were helping.

My optometrist said it was machine’s measurement error when I used used myopia curing methods to bring my eye diopters down exactly 0.75 right & 0.5 left and it exactly happened.

> I laugh whenever anyone says the US has the "best medical system in the world".

This isn't limited to the US. I am in the Netherlands and to the best of my knowledge Belgium/Germany aren't much better.

The quality of a medical system can only be reliably assessed through population level outcomes, not individual anecdotes. In some specific metrics such as cancer 5-year survival rates, the USA is consistently at or near the best in the world. In other metrics such as maternal and infant mortality we're way behind. It's inconsistent and patient experiences will vary widely based on medical condition and location.

One must normalize to how unhealthy the population is, in that case, the US medical system is doing amazingly well!

But still the little detail that of the 30 richest countries, it’s the only one where you can go bankrupt if you have medical bad luck. ;)

While medical expenses can push you to bankruptcy, more often it's the loss of earning potential that does it with severe illness (whether directly or because of need to care for family member).

That is, our general health cost picture and way insurance works is a subject of concern, but the bigger issue for this specific talking point is just general lack of safety net.

It has the best one IF you have the money that you can fly wherever you need to get the best ______________. It really is as simple as that.

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