Robert Whitfield MD describes a patient with chronic diarrhea who lived near a lake and showed signs of Giardia infection. The patient's gastroenterologist ran a colonoscopy but never tested for Giardia. When Whitfield treated for the infection, the patient recovered, showing how doctors often miss simple diagnoses by skipping basic questions about diet and environment.
It's the same thing, like, I mean, for years, you know, a patient goes to GI doc and they'd be like, "Oh, your diet has nothing to do with your gut problems." Like, and just like at a superficial level, like, you don't even have to go that far to think that that would be a pretty easy way to understand, like, your gut would be beat up by things you put in it.
Yeah. We had a patient come to us recently who clearly had a history of Giardia, lives on a lake, diarrhea for like a year., and I was like, did anybody ever think to check you for Giardia? She's like, no, I went and got a colonoscopy and they said I was fine. I was like, I mean, you sound like you have Giardia. And so we treated her for Giardia and operated on her and, you know, she got better and everything. I was just like, what are y'all doing?
Slow down, ask questions, think a bit. Mm-hmm.
I mean, she lived on a lake I mean, it's not that hard to figure out. No, but that's it. It's just, I feel like a lot of times it's just like a very superficial interaction, and a lot of times
