Are all those medical tests you keep getting necessary?
Getting older and wiser should mean we’re now better decision makers.
But there’s one very important area where we typically fall short with those age-improved skills, and that’s when it comes to agreeing to any and all medical tests and treatments the doctor orders.
Be it antibiotics, blood work, CT or MRI scans or anything else modern-day medicine has to offer, very often it’s overdone and unnecessary.
And the worst part is, it can even kill you.
Bobbi-Jo, like millions of others, suffers from chronic back pain. And she followed her doctor’s orders exactly, submitting to numerous MRIs to try and find the problem.
Suddenly she started getting an all-over twitching that wouldn’t stop, as well as a rash. Then came symptoms that were similar to MS and lupus.
It turned out she had been poisoned by the MRI contrasting agent that contained the toxic metal gadolinium (something I warned you about just last week.) Practically all of those MRIs, she now knows, were entirely unnecessary.
But MRIs are far from the only risky, excessive and expensive medical test that patients are told they must take.
And most of the time, it seems like having one — or more — can’t hurt. Plus, your doctor really needs them to find out what your problem is, right?
That mainstream medical myth is one that the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) hopes to stop with its “Choosing Wisely” campaign.
What the ABIM does is to ask for recommendations from specialty medical groups that may enable you to avoid the most unnecessary and overused tests and treatments in their field of practice. The most recent list is just out from the American Urological Association (AUA), and includes examples that should sound very familiar to eAlert readers!
One is a recommendation that low-risk, localized prostate cancer not be treated, until the patient is fully aware of his option in doing “active surveillance.” Another is to ditch the risky class of antibiotics called fluoroquinolones, such as Cipro and Levaquin, when treating women who have simple urinary tract infections.
The AUA also gives the common-sense recommendation not to continue any opioids beyond the “immediate postoperative period.”
And some common sense is probably what’s missing the most in the way doctors prescribe such a vast array of risky tests and dangerous treatments that really aren’t warranted.
For example, a specialist may very well routinely subject you to unnecessary doses of radiation that, although small, can be cumulative. Experts advise that if you’ll be seeing multiple doctors about the same condition, find out if their offices will accept existing X-rays ordered by another physician or hospital. That may save you having to take them all over again.
Of course, there are many good reasons to have such medical procedures done, but to try and cut through the fog, the Choosing Wisely campaign suggests you ask these five simple questions the next time your doctor starts making plans for all those tests.
#1: Do I really need this test or procedure?
#2: What are the risks?
#3: Are there simpler, safer options?
#4: What happens if I don’t do anything?
#5: How much does it cost, and will my insurance cover it?
As Bobbi-Jo learned the hard way after receiving all those unneeded MRIs, if you don’t ask the right questions, there can often be terrible consequences. As she now tells friends, “before you take any medicine or get any procedure, stop and think.”
And I’ll add, remember that you’re the CEO of your own body, and as that executive officer you’re entitled to know exactly what the risks and benefits are of anything you’re being asked to take or do.
“AUA ‘Choosing Wisely’ list IDs unnecessary tests, treatments” May 15, 2017, MPR, empr.com
