Medical Gaslighting: My Patient Right Now

I thought I was done talking about medical gaslighting, but I'm have to bring it up again because I have a. I'm currently dealing with someone, a patient who's actually suffering from medical gaslighting right now. Everybody listen to this, pay attention. This still happens. It's still going on today, and it's just unacceptable. It shouldn't be happening. So I have a young patient I'm working with who got a diagnosis of a really complicated illness called dermatomyositis, which, being honest, you know, my 25 years of being a medical doctor working in a hospital, different places, I'm only seeing maybe two or three cases of it. So I need specialty help. So actually referred this young lady to see a rheumatologist. Ended up seeing someone in the office, looked through labs, and this complicated patient didn't fit the typical structure. The specialist is now saying because her labs are a little different, that maybe her previous diagnosis didn't fit. And then she's seeing a naturopathic doctor, which I'm a medical doctor, but they kind of mis, mislabeled me and are kind of blowing her off and saying maybe she doesn't have a significant illness. The strange thing is that the treatment that we started her on before dermatomyosis, which is a pretty rare disease, actually has made a massive difference. A lot of the issues she's had have cleared up, but she needs additional testing, additional treatment, which just being honest, I need some specialists to kind of help with and they're 100% blowing her off simply because her diagnostic criteria don't fit the standard protocols and she's working with someone, quote, unquote alternative frustrating. This should not be going on today, 2025, in the United States, anywhere, if someone comes in and has symptoms, we're supposed to believe the patients, right? We're supposed to believe people's stories, we're not supposed to ignore them. And unfortunately what's happening is this is happening to her. And now she's at risk of not having access to health care and not being taken care of. And I'm having to step in and actually give her, you know, some pretty strong medications, which again I can do because I'm have training it, but I need some help from know a rheumatologist that can help me out. And we're going to hopefully refer her to the local medical college or find someone that can work with her. But medical gasoline is still happening, still a thing. And it's really, it's, it's frustrating, especially when it's happening like right now. Not. Not when I'm telling stories about, you know, breast cancer. Now I'm telling stories about, you know, women in fibromyalgia. Now on tame stories about hormone issues, which all these things are examples of medical gaslighting in the past. It's still going on. And still when, you know, doctors and specialists find complicated patients they can't explain, unfortunately, their most common go to is this person is psychologically unstable or they' they're malingering or they're making it up or stuff's just not really going on. So I would really like if people could share if they have experiences because I feel like this is something that mad about it to me. I would use all the language, but which is not appropriate for this kind of media. But I'm just mad that my patient's suffering right now. I'm working with helping her and this is still going on. So the only way to really get this kind of stuff to stop is for people to share their stories enough so that other doctors and other practitioners hear about it and they're like, hey, maybe I should listen to my patient with chronic fatigue and body aches and muscle aches who's having these skin lesions and all this kind of crazy stuff going on. Can't explain it. She's all steroid and she's a miraculously better. Huh? Maybe some kind of autoimmune process is going on just because they're not familiar with it, which just bothers my mind. She's being blown off. Instead of researching these people, these practitioners don't have any professional curiosity. Maybe that's the problem. Problem. Maybe our expectation of healthcare professionals is for them have a certain degree of medical curiosity like I did when I was a student. Maybe that's not a thing anymore. Maybe in our new healthcare system there is no such thing as medical curiosity. You just treat the symptoms. If they'll get better, it's all in the head. Maybe that's. Maybe that's the way it is and it kind of sort of is ways and it's not acceptable. So anyway, a little frustrating. Want to share those thoughts? I'm dealing with a patient right now who's getting gaslit by a specialist. And we'll figure it out, work it out, because I always have in the past, I'm never not figured out, but just frustrating. This is still going along today, 2025 in the United States. So please, if you have a, if you have a story of yourself being medically gaslit, being told it's all in your head being blown off, please share. And then if you found out later on what the problem was, maybe it was chronic Lyme or mold illness or reactivation, Epstein Barr or something that seemed later on seem relatively easy to figure out. Quote unquote. Share it below. I'd love to hear the stories. The more these stories get out there and the more people learn that this concept of medical gaslighting is still a thing, still going on today in 2025. And even on a side note, you know, thinking about hormones, female hormones, maybe I'll do another one about female hormones and gaslighting, because that's. We're just starting to turn the corner on that one. Maybe women will start getting a little better care when it comes to menopausal hormones. So take care. I'd love to hear your thoughts. Talk to y' all soon.