Concept tag
#medicine
-
A patient believes she will recover against the odds. Is that irrational?
A situation I meet in different forms every month, described here as a composite. A woman with a serious illness has, by the best evidence we have, about a one in three chance of recovering. She tells her doctor, and me, calmly…
Started by Tsion Bekele4 replies -
“Why did this happen to me?” What do we owe someone who asks?
Last month my cousin, a woman in her forties who has never smoked, was diagnosed with lung cancer. When I sat with her afterwards she asked: “Why did this happen to me?” I gave her a good answer, I thought, from what…
Started by Omar Ragab5 replies -
Does a diagnosis name a real condition, or a useful bundle of symptoms?
I work as an interpreter at a hospital in Addis Ababa. Some diagnoses I translate every day feel like discoveries: a particular infection, caused by a particular organism, with a test that finds it. Others feel more like agreements. "Metabolic syndrome" is…
Started by Tsion Bekele5 replies