Pracitioners teaching western doctors...

[Guest guest]

Dear Sammy, Lynn, and Esteemed Colleagues,

 

I on the other hand feel that Lynn Detamore's comments are inspired and

inspiring. Calling for ever more civilized behavior on a community chat seems a

worthy suggestion. Don't you operate a library, Ms. Detamore? Lynn Detamore's

civility might indeed be challenging for many of us to live up to, yet it's nice

to have ideals.

 

Most of my friends are MDs, and another significant batch of friends are LAcs.

I would agree with Ms. Detamore that most from both categories are quite caring

people. I would agree with Sammy that many of each are rather suspicious of

each other. However, MDs are not in any sort of envious position by my

observation. My MD friends are often envious that I had the foresight to leave

medical school in my 3rd year and move on to graduate school when I was 39 years

old. I hear things from them like, " Gee, Emmanuel was older than us in medical

school and now he looks so much younger. " Of course, Chinese medicine helps as

does a much less stressful life. (I refer you to my picture on my

profile). The fact is that we all went to Western medical school thinking that

we would be set free by our MDs. It turned out to be the opposite. I was old

enough and mature enough to actually respond to what we all could see. The

incredible indebtedness, the lack of sleep through 3rd & 4rth year medical

school and then through five years of residency. In those days, only 30% of

board certified residents turned themselves in as clinically depressed. My

sense is that the rest were mostly in denial. You don't see an income for nine

years of training, and then you only see your income lost by paying back

industrial strength loans and by paying vast malpractice premiums. I could go

on about the relationship with HMOs and other 3rd parties including lawyers, but

it's Friday and I'm in too good a mood.

 

Yes, I love Lynn Detamore's suggestion for engaging Sesame Street ethics (at the

minimum) and observing opportunities to cooperate. Not sell out, mind you.

Definitely stand your ground! But cooperation while being strong within the

paradigm of Chinese medicine will strengthen your position as a practitioner.

It will also strengthen Chinese medicine as an institution.

 

In Gratitude,

Emmanuel Segmen

Merritt College, Asia Natural

 

I am sorry but I have to disagree with the writer below for a couple of

reasons.

 

1st Reason: The " behaviour " on this list has not been " derisive,

condescending " as she claims. It has in fact been pretty civilised from what I

have read on some TCM lists. We need this kind of exchange.

 

2nd Reason: Western medicine and the institutions and infrastructure which

support it is HUGELY CORRUPT. There may be good docs out there as Marcos in

Guatemala reported, wish there were more, but there aren't. Just do a Google

search on > Lupron scandal < to see what I mean.

 

Sammy.

 

 

Lynn Detamore [healthworks]

22 August 2003 10:30

Pracitioners teaching western doctors...

 

i really do not understand the need for some of the derisive, condescending

behavior exhibited by some group members. come on, let's be decent to one

another. presumably, we are all adults here, eh? the days of 'medical deities'

are over, save those vestiges of ego that do exist in white coats. it certainly

is not fair to label the whole conventional medical establishment, nor any other

profession, on the backs of those few self-righteous. those folks exist in every

profession, including chinese medicine. we are all here to help patients. let's

review some sesame street ethics, and recall examples of cooperation.

 

if an md or do takes a short course in chinese medicine and learns enough to

make good referrals in our directions, we only lose out if they don't already

have our names and faces in their repetoire of connections!

 

i also don't understand the notion of doctors getting paid 'big money' for

medicare services. in real healthcare life no professional or patient can put

'big money' and 'medicare' in the same sentence, except to state that if

doctors bill medicare, they'll never see much money, let along big money!

 

it used to be that medical practices put caps on how many medicare patients

they could take, sometimes expressed as a percentage of their patient base. at

that point, they would not take more medicare patients. ah, but things are very

different now. the present trend is that medical practices stop billing medicare

altogether, meaning that their medicare patients have to go elsewhere.

 

doctors get screwed by medicare. those few exceptions, the more computerized

information is, sometimes end up in jail, or at least with no more medical

practice. anyone see the 60 minute episode about the cardiologist and thoracic

surgeon in redding, california? from someone who knew both of those doctors

professionally, i am told they they were really nice guys. but, they must have

been a little full of themselves, enough to think it was ethical to screw the

system by which they felt screwed. remember karma, and the

golden rule?