If you or someone you love has a disease that the doctors can’t cure, a recurring condition that can’t be diagnosed, or a medical problem that has meant seeing one specialist after another without finding any relief, this book is for you.
• Perhaps you have pain in your back, muscles, or joints for which you have undergone every available medical test and procedure to no avail.
• Maybe you’ve seen several doctors and have had a number of tests or procedures only to be given an incorrect diagnosis, a contradictory diagnosis, or worse still, no diagnosis at all.
• Possibly your doctor, family, or friends think that your illness is psychosomatic and have told you, “It’s all in your head and you should see a therapist.” Yet you know intuitively that there is something truly wrong with your body. Their comments have frustrated or even angered you, and as a result you are feeling lonely, isolated, or depressed.
If you have an undiagnosed or a misdiagnosed illness, you are not alone. Millions of patients suffer from mysterious symptoms and cannot obtain a correct diagnosis or relief. If you or someone you love is unable to find solutions from the medical establishment, you’ll find hope and help in this book.
I have been a practicing lawyer for more than twenty-five years, a writer, and a mother. I know firsthand the frustration of living with doubt, the endless search for answers, and the disruption that can result from having symptoms that physicians can’t diagnose. From time to time, I have had conditions that defied diagnosis. Most recently, I had a neuropathic condition of seven years’ duration which, until last year, caused chronic urinary tract infections and unrelenting pain. Even now, though the infections are gone and my pain has lessened, I still cannot sit for any great length of time without some discomfort. (Imagine practicing law and writing this book having to stand rather than sit!)
After years without a correct diagnosis, I did my own “medical detective” work and used the Eight Steps to Self-Diagnosis to find a diagnosis and secure significant relief. I share the details of my personal story in Chapter 8.
When I first discussed my symptoms with my friend Jerry Rosenbaum, M.D., a board-certified rheumatologist, I described my condition as a “mystery malady.” He liked the term, and it has stuck.
As a highly regarded physician and diagnostician with more than twenty-six years of medical experience, Dr. Rosenbaum has seen, and often helped, thousands of patients with such conditions. Even though he is a doctor, he too has suffered his share of mystery maladies. In fact, before we started writing this book, he was struck with a new one: an eye disease that ranking specialists in the nation have been unable to accurately diagnose or cure. You’ll find Dr. Rosenbaum’s personal story in Chapter 16.
Plato once said, “Good doctors themselves ought to have the diseases they want to cure, and been subject themselves to the misfortunes and circumstances they have to diagnose. Let them catch the pox, if they want to know how to cure it. Then, and only then, I’d trust such a doctor.” We are fortunate to have such a physician in Dr. Rosenbaum.
What’s Wrong with Me? The Frustrated Patient’s Guide to Getting an Accurate Diagnosis represents the culmination of our personal experiences in learning to become “medical detectives” from the perspective of both patient and physician. Using my deductive reasoning abilities as an attorney and Dr. Rosenbaum’s clinical skills and medical knowledge, we have developed this revolutionary self-diagnosis model that has helped not only us but many others as well. The real beauty of this model is that it so simple to learn. You don’t have to be a doctor. Anyone can use it.
Our intention is to help others help themselves, just as we have done. We offer information and ideas to stimulate new ways of thinking about undiagnosed and misdiagnosed ailments. And given the current state of health care and its diagnostic crisis, we believe that patients must assume responsibility for their own health.
In Part 1, we will show you how to approach your condition much like any other mystery you are trying to solve and invite you to become your own “medical detective.” We’ll guide you through the simple, easy-to-use Eight Steps to Self-Diagnosis and show you how to develop your own clues and follow them to a correct diagnosis.
We’ll also show you how to choose the right physicians and generate the most effective ways to communicate with them to obtain the maximum cooperation. This is particularly important if your symptoms cross over several areas of medical specialization, because physicians tend to focus exclusively on their own area while the patient as a “whole” is often not addressed. We’ll also give you some do’s and don’ts of using the Internet for doing medical research. This is a program designed for getting to the bottom of what’s wrong with you.
In Part 2, you will have an opportunity to apply what you have learned about medical detective work. Case studies of real patients (men, women, and children) involving a wide array of frequently undiagnosed and misdiagnosed conditions are presented. Each story contains all the “clues” you need to work out a diagnosis and illustrates how the Eight Steps were used to get to a diagnosis. We hope that by observing the diagnostic process you will be able to apply what you’ve learned to your own condition. We intend to make you a real medical detective and enlist the aid of your physician in this goal.
In Part 3, we share practical advice for living with a mystery illness. We offer suggestions for improving your emotional and physical health until a diagnosis and cure is found, including information on chronic pain and the stresses that accompany it. We will also look at many ways to take care of yourself and your relationships and emphasize that “health” is a much broader concept than the absence of physical disease. We offer supportive guidance and ideas on how to find health in your mind and spirit.
The advice we give is intended to enhance your relationship with your physicians, not to replace it. But there is no reason you cannot solve your own mystery malady with a physician’s assistance. I did, and we know you can too! We are right beside you.
Lynn M. Dannheisser
If you like this post then please consider subscribing to our HaCkaFiLe RSS feed. You can also subcribe by email and have news, updates and articles sent directly to your inbox.
Please don't forget to leave comments, share and reffer this site to your friends and family. Thank You.
0 comments:
Post a Comment
Your comments are the only thing that motivates us. Please leave comments. Thank You!