The lay public is clueless about how doctors are educated and how they stay up to date. The above statement reflects the beliefs of most patients I encounter on a daily basis. They are wrong. Dead wrong.
Doctors do turn to trusted sources when researching a disease and/or looking for topical updates. Practicing doctors are completely unaware of the raging controversy which has been going on for many years now. Major players on the two sides of the dispute are listed below. It is unlikely that a diligent physician looking for information about Lyme disease would encounter any information suggesting that the IDSA guidelines are in dispute. The current maneuvering of the IDSA is designed to ensure that the status-quo remains unperturbed.
Group number one:
Chronic Lyme is real:
ILADS: marginalized- a fringe group.
Dr Burrascano- Medical board issues- discredited.
Dr. Jones- Medical board issues- discredited.
Dr. Jemsek- license to practice in North Carolina suspended- thoroughly discredited
Dr. Horowitz- ILADS president- emphasis on CAM- ridiculed by mainstream- evidence based medicine
Dr. Stricker- discredited in various and sordid ways- none credible
Other ILADs physicians- off the radar- no academic credentials- irrelevant
Dr. Donta- Good credentials- Professor of infectious disease medicine at Boston University- No publications in highly esteemed journals like New England Journal of Medicine- marginalized- a single voice- an outlier.
Group number two:
Legitimate- dependable sources of Medical information:
There is no chronic Lyme:
IDSA
CDC
Harvard
Mayo Clinic
Johns Hopkins
All other prestigious medical universities ? Columbia: "Fallon is not a real doctor- he is a psychiatrist- his work doesn't count"
All major textbooks including Harrison's textbook of medicine- all current textbooks of infectious disease medicine
"Up to date"
Quack Watch
Neurologists and their professional organization
Rheumatologists- rheumatology literature and texts
The New England Journal of Medicine
99.999% of practicing infectious disease specialists in the US
Dr. Wormser
Dr. Steere
Local community specialists
US University specialists and medical school professors
Primary care physicians who defer to the above mentioned sources for judgments and recommendations
State Medical Boards and governing authorities
No, doctors are not lazy or poorly informed about new developments in the field of chronic Lyme disease and tick borne illness. They are entirely up to date.
When well informed physicians encounter the treatments of LLMDs along the way they will know one thing for sure. If it looks like a duck- Quack.
PS: Let there be no confusion about what I believe. The so called discredited physicians mentioned above, have been unfairly persecuted. They are all heroes- who have advanced the understanding and treatment of Lyme and related illness at great personal cost and to the benefit of thousands of patients afflicted with this horrific illness.
I think this is probably the most fundamentally important post you ever made.
ReplyDeleteThese are all smart men, way smarter than me so i don't know the actually problem they're having. But i know most docs look in medical literature for info.
Unfortunately most docs won't give the internet a try. Which seems to be where we get stuck fending for ourselves.
The internet is not considered a valid source for medical information.
ReplyDeleteExcept for mainstream sources like WebMD- which follow the same party line.
This applies to other disciplines as well.
School children are not allowed to quote Wikipedia for school projects.
yeah i know it's not a valid source. What i mean is give it a browse to see "why are my patients saying they've read this and that etc.."
ReplyDeletejust to see an overview of why the patients are upset. Then use proper medical texts to make up their own minds.
hmm guess i can't edit.
ReplyDeleteTo make it simple i mean this..
if i said doc could you check out this lymemd site? they'd say NO. period end of story. Cause it's on the internet. that's what i meant.
You are definitely an outlier and a very decent, caring, highly intelligent and ethical physician. I give thanks every night that I found you and had limited experience with the "establishment"
ReplyDeleteI am a PhD and licensed professional engineer. I am a member of NSPE, ASCE and other societies of my profession. In earlier years when I was a professor I worked on local, national and international committees. I must say that I am honored to be in this profession. We support one another and try to be proactive finding problems and tackling them head on so I cannot understand a profession that turns its back on its peers, slanders them, tosses them aside striping them of their license and honor. Is it ego, power, territorial disputes, jealosy, ignorance or all of the above.
Once again, I thank you very much and know how lucky I am. If the medical profession is doing this and is so ignorant why have I been so naive to think the legal profession would help me? My treatment has, once again, been denied.
The worry I have is that this is unlikely to be a slow gradual change in mainstream acceptance of chronic lyme. While activism is important, I truly don't think IDSA and mainstream medicine will come around to the chronic view until there is indisputable. There is *some* evidence of chronic infection in legitimate journals - but its easily dismissed which is unfortunate.
ReplyDeleteI think it will take a definitive test or indisputable proff for the tides to change. I hope it comes soon but with so few people working on the science side of it - who knows. I hope ILADS or Fallon or some organization is better able to organize the research and science side of the disease.
Personally I believe there is a third group:
ReplyDeleteThose physicians who believe that there is more to Lyme than what they have been told by the IDSA et. al. and will make sure that those close to them are treated aggressively, but spout the politically correct jargon to their peers, their hospitals, and their patients.
The worst of the worst is that the more they deny it, the more this gets near to become a pandemic illness... or, is this what they want?
ReplyDeleteWho is they?
ReplyDeleteEvil? Unlikely. Stubborn and arrogant- probably.
There is none so blind as he who will not see.
Why this disease? It was not this way until the IDSA stepped in. I answered my question. Silence was the initial response to AIDS then a massive flurry of activity. Now AIDS patients live so "When you say I name I no longer exist" Who/what am I??
ReplyDeleteSILENCE
We must organize and if we don't quit we will be heard.