It is always a good idea to talk to your primary care practitioner, the clinician who knows you best, about procedures suggested consulting physicians.
A Kaiser Health News article noted: “The medical profession has historically been reluctant to condemn unwarranted but often lucrative tests and treatments that can rack up costs to patients but not improve their health and can sometimes hurt them. But in 2012, medical specialty societies began publishing lists of at least five services that both doctors and patients should consider skeptically. So far, 54 specialty societies have each offered recommendations and distributed them to more than a half-million doctors.”
“Some specialists did target their own money-makers. Gastroenterologists, radiologists and clinical pathologists all placed their own tests on their lists. The Society of General Internal Medicine recommended against the annual physical exam, a mainstay of American health care.”
“The American College of Cardiology opted to list the use of cardiac testing in four circumstances. But the college did not tackle what studies suggest is the most frequent type of overtreatment in the field: inserting small mesh tubes called stents to prop open arteries of patients who are not suffering heart attacks, rather than first prescribing medicine or encouraging a healthier lifestyle.”
“The cardiologists did discourage one specific use of stenting, where doctors opening a clogged artery place additional stents in other places where screenings have spotted the starts of blockage. Stents are a profit center for the group of cardiologists who perform procedures, often known as invasive cardiologists.”
Click here to read the full Kaiser Health News article ”Doctors Overlook Lucrative Procedures When Naming Unwise Treatments” by Jordan Rau.
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Doctor, Did You Wash Your Hands? ™ provides information to consumers on understanding, managing and navigating health care options.
Jonathan M. Metsch, Dr.P.H., is Clinical Professor, Preventive Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Adjunct Professor, Baruch College ( C.U.N.Y.), Rutgers School of Public Health, and Rutgers School of Public Affairs and Administration.
This blog shares general information about understanding and navigating the health care system. For specific medical advice about your own problems, issues and options talk to your personal physician.