SICKNESS? Going to see your doctor? Ask your GP these questions before accepting any medical treatment

Most people, when unwell, go to their doctor for diagnosis and medical treatment. And when their doctor prescribes treatment, especially when this involves pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines, we usually take them, reluctantly. We do so on two assumptions

1. They are effective, and will make us better
2. They are safe, and will not harm us.

More and more people now seriously question both these assumptions. So when our doctor offers medical treatment, so when we are uncertain about what we should do we have two main options. To accept, and hope that the drugs work and do no harm us. Or we can just dig in our heels, and refuse the treatment being offered.

A third option is to ask questions, not just for our satisfaction, but to emphasise the point that our position is open-minded, logical, and that if it can be demonstrated that pharmaceutical medicine is safe and effective we will be happy to accept it. But not otherwise.

So we should be prepared to ask important questions, not to be 'awkward', but to protect ourselves from potentially harmful treatment, on the following basis:

• you will accept the treatment offered - as long as you can be assured that it is both safe and effective.
• you are not opposed to pharmaceutical drugs, as long as they are effective, and will not cause you personal harm.
• you we are not 'anti-vax', guided by 'disinformation' or 'conspiracy theories', but wish to ensure that the treatment offered is effective and safe.

Diagnosis and Treatment Plan
Once your doctor has diagnosed your illness treatment is usually offered. This treatment may, or may not, involve taking pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines.

• Ask your doctor to explain his/her diagnosis of your illness, and the future prognosis.
• Ask your doctor about whether there are any non-pharmaceutical ways of treating your illness (there often are).
• For example, ask your doctor if there is any dietary or nutritional advice that is helpful in treating your illness which can be used without having to resort to pharmaceutical intervention.
• If the problem concerns mental health, ask whether there are talking therapies that can be used without having to take pharmaceutical drugs.
• Similarly, ask your doctor about physical and mental exercise, and other life style changes, that you can make to treat your illness before resorting to drug treatment.

Often conventional doctors will be able to recommend a treatment plan that includes these non-drug treatments, and may even refer you to a dietician or nutritionist, to yoga or swimming classes, to talking therapy sessions, and similar. All these can be positively helpful to the doctor too, they often complain that they feel under pressure from patients to prescribe pharmaceutical drugs, and are often happy to offer this kind of help.

Pharmaceutical Drug Treatment
If your doctor still feels that pharmaceutical intervention is necessary, inform him/her that you want to make an informed decision about the safety and effectiveness of the drug treatment being offered.  

 

You should remember, at all times, that the decision to accept or refuse the treatment offered by your doctor, is entirely your own; doctors cannot force you to accept any treatment.

• Ask your doctor how long you will need to take the prescribed pharmaceutical drug treatment.
• Ask your doctor about any contraindications to the pharmaceutical drug treatment offered, and whether there is any reason why you, personally, should not take the prescribed drugs.
• Ask your doctor to tell you about all the known side effects, adverse drug reactions, of the prescribed treatment.
• Inform your doctor that you will need to see the 'Patient Information Leaflet' (PIL) that accompanies every packet of prescribed drugs. If the doctor does not have a copy of the PIL, ask for an online link so that you can read them.
• Ask your doctor if there are any additional side effects of the prescribed drug treatment, including suspected, but not yet proven side effects, so not included in the PIL. 
• Ask your doctor for time to study the prescribed drugs on websites like drugs.com  or rxisk.org.
• Ask you doctor if there is any guarantee that you will not experience the side effects listed for the drug(s) that are being prescribed. Not unreasonably, (s)he will not be able to do so.
  

All pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines have side effects, and some of them can seriously damage our health. Doctors do admit this, but routinely prescribe them on the basis that "they do more good than harm" or are "well tolerated". So we all need to make an informed choice about whether the drug(s) prescribed are likely to do more harm than good; and whether we are prepared to take the risk of suffering from the side effects. After all, it is our health that is being discussed.

 

Natural Medical Treatment
With an illness or disease there are many medical therapies that will offer alternative medical treatment, principally from natural medical therapies. Doctors will not usually mentioned this, and if they do it should be remembered that conventional doctors are not usually qualified in these therapies, and know little about them. However, these questions might be useful to ascertain if your doctor is aware of alternative medical therapies, what (s)he thinks about them, and whether (s)he can refer you on for treatment.

• Ask your doctor if there are natural medical therapies that would be able to treat your illness, safely and effectively, such as homeopathy, naturopathy, herbalism, acupuncture, et al.
• If the doctor makes critical or disparaging remarks ask whether (s)he is qualified to make such judgements on medical therapies.
• Ask your doctor whether (s)he can refer you to a qualified local therapist who can explain these alternative natural treatments, and offer treatment.

Drug Side Effects
If, after asking all these questions, you decide to take the prescribed drugs or vaccines, there are still important questions to ask. It is not just 'balancing' the benefits and the harm that needs to be questioned, but the reporting of drug and vaccine side effects. 

 

Studies have shown that only between 1% to 10% of side effects are ever reported. So when you decide to take the prescribed drugs, and you do experience side effects, you need to know that they will be reported - if only for the sake of future patients.

• Ask your doctor about the process of reporting side effects should you experience them, and whether (s)he will guarantee to do so should you report them.
• Ask your doctor to sign a form that guarantees the safety of the pharmaceutical drugs or vaccines that have been prescribed.
• Ask your doctor about arrangements in your country for injury compensation should the prescribed treatment cause personal harm.
• Ask your doctor whether it is possible to take legal proceedings in your country against medical authorities, or pharmaceutical companies, in the event of being damaged by the prescribed drugs.

MANDATORY MEDICATION
At the moment, the decision to take any pharmaceutical drugs or vaccines is entirely a matter for the individual. However, asking these questions will become increasingly important in a world in which governments, national health services, and powerful pharmaceutical and commercial interests, are seeking to remove patient choice and health freedoms. 

 

We will then need to protect our liberty, and our health, by justifying our refusal to accept medical treatment, not least to maintain our right to refuse pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines.

• We need to make the conventional medical establishment aware of our concerns.

• We need to insist that no medical treatment is allowed to harm us.

• We have to be clear we will accept medical treatment ONLY if it is safe and will not harm us.

However, the problem is that trying to link pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines with 'safety' and 'effectiveness' is an oxymoron! They just don't go together.

The evidence for this can be found firmly embedded within the literature of the conventional medical establishment itself!

 

And it is this medical evidence that will enable us to make an informed choice, and firmly place responsibility for causing harm on the conventional medical establishment.

Patient Choice. What if a Visit to the Doctor went like this?

When we are sick today, a visit to the doctor always ends in the same way. The doctor listens to our problems. We are asked questions by the doctor. We undertake some tests suggested by the doctor. The doctor diagnoses what is wrong, and writes a prescription for pharmaceutical drugs.

That is how our dominant, monopolistic, pharmaceutical-led medical system works today. We are sick. And we get pharmaceutical medical treatment - whether we like it or not! There is no health freedom.

So what would happen if our health services were operated on the principle of Health Freedom? What if Patient Choice held sway within conventional medicine. What if the concept of "no decision about me without me" was put into operation. What would a visit to the doctor be like then?

Probably much the same, at least to begin with.

• The doctor will listen to our problems. 
• ask us questions. 
• perhaps undertake some tests. 
• then the doctor will diagnose what is wrong. 

But then the doctor will provide us with information about the choices we have - we would be asked about our treatment preferences.

So let's suppose we have some sort of pain, perhaps lower back pain, or fibromyalgia, or rheumatoid arthritis, or osteoarthritis.

• The doctor will probably do what (s)he does now - offer us painkilling drugs; but now we will be shown the Patient Information Leaflet, which includes information about known drug side effects, and (s)he will explain how painkillers only dampen pain for a short time, a palliative response to the pain that will not be effective in treating our illness.

• Patient Choice. The doctor will then reach for several leaflets outlining other forms of treatment, perhaps dietary and nutritional advice, physiotherapy, osteopathy, chiropractor, naturopathy, homeopathy, acupuncture, Alexander technique, yoga, and many others.

• Informed Choice. We would then be asked to read the leaflets. The leaflets would be written by health professionals who are qualified in their particular therapy. On this basis we would decide which treatment we would prefer to use.

• No decision about me without me. Alongside the doctor we would then make our decision. We would have the option of working directly with the doctor with pharmaceutical medicine. Or we would ask for, and the doctor would refer us on to a naturopath, a homeopath, an acupuncturist, et al., for a course of treatment of our choice for a defined periods of time.

• Patient Outcome Assessment. At the end of an agreed period of treatment we would return to the doctor, tell him how we are, and in particular whether our pain was worse, the same, or improved. 
• On the basis of this, alongside the doctor, we would fill in a form to assess the outcome of the treatment.
• The form would then be submitted for analysis, along with millions of others, to assess the outcome of the treatment for the patient. 
• Comparative outcomes of the different treatment therapies for similar conditions would then be calculated.
• Treatment outcomes would then become part of the information provided to us at every stage of our treatment.

• Further Treatment. The outcome of the discussion would be a decision about further treatment, whether to continue with the treatment for another period, or to try another kind of medical therapy. And the process would begin again.

We have freedom of choice in most other spheres of life

- so why not in medicine too?

Doctors continue to leave the NHS in droves, yet another sign of the failure of conventional medicine

Several articles in the doctor's e-magazine this week attracted my attention. I have long been arguing that conventional, drug-based medicine is failing, and that it is this failure that underlies the ongoing crisis in the National Health Service in Britain.

The first article stated that "almost 3,000 GPs retired before the age of 60 over the past five years". There are probably two reasons for this, doctors are well paid and many might feel financially able to retire early. Or, of course, working in the NHS is such a stressful job doctors want to get out of it as soon as they can. Reading the comments of doctors on articles published in the magazine the main reason seems to be the latter.

Yet what can be more rewarding than working as a doctor helping patients, and curing illness and disease? 

The problem is, as I have long argued in this blog, is that this is just not happening. And what job is less rewarding than treating sick patients who continue coming back, no better, or even sicker?

The government is aware of the problem of GP shortage, and have taken action. The second article reveals that result of these government measures. "Number of GPs continues to decline as 200 leave in three months".  As the article says, "the GP workforce in England is continuing to decline with 219 full-time equivalent GPs lost to the profession since September (2017)". Clearly not a helpful situation when the NHS continues in crisis, and patients find it difficult to book an appointment with a GP!

The inevitable result of an increasingly sick population and a declining number of doctors is that the remaining doctors have an increased workload. This is what the third Pulse article confirms. "Over 80% of GPs say workload has worsened since GP Forward View". The article is based on a Pulse survey of NHS doctors which concluded that "the Government's £2.4bn general practice rescue package has failed to relieve GP workload two years on".

The failure of conventional medicine, dominated by pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines as it is, has been ongoing now since the NHS made them available to everyone, free at the point of use, 70 years ago. It has been quite predictable. And whilst the conventional medical monopoly with the NHS continues, the NHS will continue to fail, or the entire system will be bankrupted.

• Pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines fail to make patients better, and through their side effects actually make them sicker. 

• And the NHS ignores safer and more effective medical therapies.

It is time patients started to take action, for the sake of heir own health, and say 'No' to pharmaceutical drugs, and begin to demand safer, more effective medical therapies.