Are doctors corrupted or controlled by big pharma?

[gsjackson]

I guess their drugs nearly killed me. Last year I had a partial knee replacement, and there apparently was nerve damage that would wake me up after an hour. So I got a prescription from the doctor for hydrocodone, and would take it after I woke up to get back to sleep. Four weeks later I'm in the hospital with acute pancreatitis, with what the emergency room nurse said were the highest readings she had ever seen for that sometimes fatal condition.

I have no doubt whatsoever that the drugs caused the condition, but not only wouldn't the doctors entertain that possibility, they twisted my arm to let them take out my gall bladder. They got off of that pretty quickly when a counselor type who came in found out I was a lawyer. Only after leaving the hospital "against medical advice" did I find out from my GP that their own tests showed I had no gallstones.

Scary stuff. Good thing to know, though, that I won't be getting addicted to opioids, since they nearly killed me in just a few weeks.

I don't mean to pry, and feel free to ignore this question if you like. I've always heard that if you leave AMA that you have to pay the bill yourself, as the insurance company takes this as a loophole to escape reimbursement. Did they try to make you pay for leaving AMA?

How is your nerve pain now?

Was the counselor one of those social workers?

I wonder, if when you tried to connect the condition with the pain killer, if they began their sentence with, "According to the scientific literature there are no cases like this..."

I was concerned about that -- and with three days in the hospital, including an MRI, it would have been many thousands -- but I never got a bill. I don't know whether it was because my insurance was Medicare (which I'd heard will deny payment for AMA), or because the hospital was guilty of malpractice by not just recommending, but really twisting my arm to have a gall bladder removal when their tests showed I had no gall stones.

The dingbat female osteopath who was the case manager had actually showed me a photo on her phone of something circular with lots of dots in it and clearly implied that it was the ultrasound x-ray of my gall bladder, replete with multiple gall stones. She wouldn't release me when I felt fine because "we haven't figured out the cause yet." Well, I had. I had taken more prescription drugs in the previous six weeks because of the knee surgery than I had in the entire rest of my life.

The nerve pain went away shortly after that. There's sill some numbness in the knee, and the surgeon obviously damaged a nerve, but overall I'm very happy with the outcome. Switching out defective body parts is one thing western medicine does very well, and is a blessing. I had premature arthritis in the knee and a hip because of old sports injuries, and I would be living as a cripple today were it not for these procedures.

I guess the counselor type was some sort of social worker. Not sure.

If they didn't use those actual words about "the literature," and at least one doctor did, that was the clear implication of their responses to my hypothesis about the drugs being the cause. Referencing studies paid for by drug companies, no doubt. I suppose they have to build a rock solid liability fortress around these drugs, because think of the malpractice can of worms it would open if the profession started admitting to some of the side effects.

[Adama]

I guess their drugs nearly killed me. Last year I had a partial knee replacement, and there apparently was nerve damage that would wake me up after an hour. So I got a prescription from the doctor for hydrocodone, and would take it after I woke up to get back to sleep. Four weeks later I'm in the hospital with acute pancreatitis, with what the emergency room nurse said were the highest readings she had ever seen for that sometimes fatal condition.

I have no doubt whatsoever that the drugs caused the condition, but not only wouldn't the doctors entertain that possibility, they twisted my arm to let them take out my gall bladder. They got off of that pretty quickly when a counselor type who came in found out I was a lawyer. Only after leaving the hospital "against medical advice" did I find out from my GP that their own tests showed I had no gallstones.

Scary stuff. Good thing to know, though, that I won't be getting addicted to opioids, since they nearly killed me in just a few weeks.

I don't mean to pry, and feel free to ignore this question if you like. I've always heard that if you leave AMA that you have to pay the bill yourself, as the insurance company takes this as a loophole to escape reimbursement. Did they try to make you pay for leaving AMA?

How is your nerve pain now?

Was the counselor one of those social workers?

I wonder, if when you tried to connect the condition with the pain killer, if they began their sentence with, "According to the scientific literature there are no cases like this..."

I was concerned about that -- and with three days in the hospital, including an MRI, it would have been many thousands -- but I never got a bill. I don't know whether it was because my insurance was Medicare (which I'd heard will deny payment for AMA), or because the hospital was guilty of malpractice by not just recommending, but really twisting my arm to have a gall bladder removal when their tests showed I had no gall stones.

The dingbat female osteopath who was the case manager had actually showed me a photo on her phone of something circular with lots of dots in it and clearly implied that it was the ultrasound x-ray of my gall bladder, replete with multiple gall stones. She wouldn't release me when I felt fine because "we haven't figured out the cause yet." Well, I had. I had taken more prescription drugs in the previous six weeks because of the knee surgery than I had in the entire rest of my life.

The nerve pain went away shortly after that. There's sill some numbness in the knee, and the surgeon obviously damaged a nerve, but overall I'm very happy with the outcome. Switching out defective body parts is one thing western medicine does very well, and is a blessing. I had premature arthritis in the knee and a hip because of old sports injuries, and I would be living as a cripple today were it not for these procedures.

I guess the counselor type was some sort of social worker. Not sure.

If they didn't use those actual words about "the literature," and at least one doctor did, that was the clear implication of their responses to my hypothesis about the drugs being the cause. Referencing studies paid for by drug companies, no doubt. I suppose they have to build a rock solid liability fortress around these drugs, because think of the malpractice can of worms it would open if the profession started admitting to some of the side effects.

Back around 2012 I spent an overnight in a hospital for a surgery. I asked them how much it was going to cost. The estimate I got from one woman was $700. Others told me that it couldn't be priced for sure, and that they would bill me. The bill when I got it was over $4,000. For one night in the hospital. I was receiving IV antibiotics and got a few meals, and a pain killer.

And the insurance I had at that time from working full time only covered part of what the doctor performed. Luckily he is an awesome, understanding doctor.

[HouseMD]

I guess their drugs nearly killed me. Last year I had a partial knee replacement, and there apparently was nerve damage that would wake me up after an hour. So I got a prescription from the doctor for hydrocodone, and would take it after I woke up to get back to sleep. Four weeks later I'm in the hospital with acute pancreatitis, with what the emergency room nurse said were the highest readings she had ever seen for that sometimes fatal condition.

I have no doubt whatsoever that the drugs caused the condition, but not only wouldn't the doctors entertain that possibility, they twisted my arm to let them take out my gall bladder. They got off of that pretty quickly when a counselor type who came in found out I was a lawyer. Only after leaving the hospital "against medical advice" did I find out from my GP that their own tests showed I had no gallstones.

Scary stuff. Good thing to know, though, that I won't be getting addicted to opioids, since they nearly killed me in just a few weeks.

I don't mean to pry, and feel free to ignore this question if you like. I've always heard that if you leave AMA that you have to pay the bill yourself, as the insurance company takes this as a loophole to escape reimbursement. Did they try to make you pay for leaving AMA?

How is your nerve pain now?

Was the counselor one of those social workers?

I wonder, if when you tried to connect the condition with the pain killer, if they began their sentence with, "According to the scientific literature there are no cases like this..."

I was concerned about that -- and with three days in the hospital, including an MRI, it would have been many thousands -- but I never got a bill. I don't know whether it was because my insurance was Medicare (which I'd heard will deny payment for AMA), or because the hospital was guilty of malpractice by not just recommending, but really twisting my arm to have a gall bladder removal when their tests showed I had no gall stones.

The dingbat female osteopath who was the case manager had actually showed me a photo on her phone of something circular with lots of dots in it and clearly implied that it was the ultrasound x-ray of my gall bladder, replete with multiple gall stones. She wouldn't release me when I felt fine because "we haven't figured out the cause yet." Well, I had. I had taken more prescription drugs in the previous six weeks because of the knee surgery than I had in the entire rest of my life.

The nerve pain went away shortly after that. There's sill some numbness in the knee, and the surgeon obviously damaged a nerve, but overall I'm very happy with the outcome. Switching out defective body parts is one thing western medicine does very well, and is a blessing. I had premature arthritis in the knee and a hip because of old sports injuries, and I would be living as a cripple today were it not for these procedures.

I guess the counselor type was some sort of social worker. Not sure.

If they didn't use those actual words about "the literature," and at least one doctor did, that was the clear implication of their responses to my hypothesis about the drugs being the cause. Referencing studies paid for by drug companies, no doubt. I suppose they have to build a rock solid liability fortress around these drugs, because think of the malpractice can of worms it would open if the profession started admitting to some of the side effects.

Drugs are one of the most common causes of acute pancreatitis. That they did not entertain that idea is, quite frankly, stupid. The most common cause of acute pancreatitis is obstruction by gallstones, sounds like they just jumped to conclusions like idiots. Other major cause that is common is alcohol, and there is one other thing I can't quite remember because I'm a few years out from doing anything general surgery related. I think it was extremely high lipids... And then there are a bunch of less common things (scorpion bites, for instance, one of those classic board questions). But drugs are number 3 iirc, and drug-induced pancreatitis is common. If you also had been drinking any alcohol to deal with the pain, it would have had a synergistic effect on the inflammatory process, making it many times worse. That they did not consider this speaks to poor medical care. It is also likely that if you had small stones, they were secondary to cholestasis from your pain medication, and that they were small enough that they passed once you stopped with the pills and your gallbladder began contracting normally again.

This is the problem though, people tend to form their opinions based on the dumbass doctors they come across rather than the good ones that are out there. I probably would have put you on bowel rest (which is critical, as the pancreas basically starts digesting itself in acute pancreatitis and anything that stimulates it will make that worse) with a clear liquid diet and had you wait it out, but that's just me. I also tended to not give pain medication to my acute pancreatitis patients precisely because of the risk that the medications could make things worse. You can survive pain, but you can't survive necrotizing pancreatitis.

[gsjackson]

That's remarkable. They did literally pooh-pooh the idea that drugs could be responsible. Even the surgeon, when I saw him later, not just the people in the hospital. Guess he was concerned about a malpractice suit because he prescribed the hydrocodone, though he needn't have been. I'm not litigious, but if they actually had taken out my gall bladder -- see you at the courthouse. Only my GP acknowledged that drugs could have caused it.

At the hospital they considered only two causes of pancreatitis -- alcohol and gallstones -- and since I hardly ever drink, and hadn't at all in weeks, they decided it must be gallstones, regardless of what the tests said.

The first part of this process was exemplary medicine. The supervising doctor in the emergency room, a female naturopath (I assume -- ND), had it diagnosed within an hour and a half, and put me on bowel rest for three days, at the end of which I felt fine. Only when the new case manager and the surgeon got involved, exercising their meager analytical skills, did things get crazy.