Doctor Curmudgeon® No…No…No…No…

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By Diane Batshaw Eisman, MD FAAFP

I am home today, sitting at my computer, staring at my desk which is definitely a clone of the one in the office, as it is covered with papers and notes and all kinds of things that I have to do.

It is times like these that I ruminate, sip coffee, and muse about the week. Perhaps, muse is not the most appropriate word, because I am most annoyed and feeling a tad curmudgeonly…even at this supposedly restful time.

It was just yesterday afternoon, when I saw a patient with hypertension and his blood pressure was elevated. As he had not reached the maximal dosage of his current medication, I was about to discuss increasing it. However, a light bulb exploded frantically above my head, and so I asked the patient a simple question:

“Are you taking your blood pressure pill every day?”
He smiled at me as he answered, “No, Doc, I finished.”

“Finished?”

Nodding his head, he smiled again at me. “Yeah, I took the last pill in the prescription and so I don’t need any more.”

Thinking to myself, I said ‘In what universe does he not need more?’

Calming myself down as I sniffed the lavender oil on my wrist, I continued, “Listen, you have very, very, high blood pressure, you cannot just stop taking your medicine.”

“But I thought I just had to take it for 90 days, and I was cured, so I was finished with the medicine.”

“No, you cannot stop taking it. If you do, you could have a heart attack or a stroke or die.”

He just kept smiling as he looked at me, “I do not want to hurt your feelings, but I will not take any medicine.”

“But, we have talked so many times, and I keep telling you how dangerous high blood pressure is. Just tell me why you won’t take the medicine. You feel well with it. You have no side effects. When you take it every day your blood pressure has been fine. Why, oh why, won’t you stay on it.

It is even cheap!”

“My brother says I must not take it and that all medicines are poison.”

With my sarcasm font full on, I asked quite demurely, “Oh? Is your brother a doctor?”

A negative head shake.

“Is he a pharmacologist?”

“Oh, none of those. But he’s always on the computer and he sees what is on the internet and always gives me the facts.”

Don’t get me started about what happened when I discussed the importance of the flu vaccine!

Doctor Curmudgeon® is Diane Batshaw Eisman, M.D., a physician-satirist. This column originally appeared on SERMO, the leading global social network for doctors.

SERMO www.sermo.com “talk real world medicine”

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