MIT medical recommendations?

[forgotten_aria]

I haven't seen a doctor in a very long time. The last time I tried, I got given to a "nurse practioner" who gave me one of the biggest pieces of bullshit diagnoies I've ever had. I really should see a doctor, as I'm behind on immunizations and I should also get tested for thyroid levels (for various reasons.) I have MIT medical through Greg's work. Greg likes his doctor well enough (who is also listed as my doctor) but that doctor is always busy, so more than likely you get shuttled off to a nurse practitioner.

Anyone have a recommendation for different MIT medical doctor? Things that are important to me is that the doctor is willing to say, "well, I don't know, but here's why I'm guessing this..." needs to not treat me like a hypochondriac when I'm trying to give them as much information as possible, especially when I haven't seen a doctor in ages, and isn't so busy as I might actually get to see them.

I think that feeling that I'm bothering them by giving information is the biggest thing from keeping me from going to the doctor.

Comments

[jered]

When I was at MIT Medical I really liked Dr. Howard Heller. The website says he's not accepting new patients, but it can't hurt to double-check.

[dcltdw]

Not sure if you were trying to generalize about NPs (nurse practitioners) or not, but if you were, while I totally believe there are moron NPs, I don't think that's a rule. In some ways, I trust an NP more than a doc. I've heard of many people going the NP route because they get nearly all the authority/responsibility of patient care without all the rest (administration, some flavors of politics). Also, I don't know if med school / residency drums out the people going into medicine just for the status; if not, then a status-oriented person is going to go for their MD, not NP.

Now, all that said, anyone doing patient contact who doesn't listen to the patient is a moron. Go you for not putting up with that. :)

Have you tried using the question, "What else could it be?"? I forget where I read that that's a good way to get a doc to reboot their line of thinking (I think I heard that on an NPR segment, actually) because 1, they hopefully start from scratch, 2, without you implying that you think they're wrong.

I think that feeling that I'm bothering them by giving information is the biggest thing from keeping me from going to the doctor.

If you're amenable to solutions: maybe write out your signs and symptoms? Offhand, it might help you marshall your thoughts, and maybe the care provider would be more amenable to working through a fixed list.