This New York Times letter to the editor caught my eye…
Second opinions are so very necessary in a case of a difficult diagnosis, or when treatment will be needed for chronic recurrences of a disease, or in particular when a patient needs surgery.
Patients are way too often intimidated at the thought of telling their doctors they think they should be a second opinion. They are afraid the doctor won’t approve.
Hey! Let me tell you — ANY doctor who is ANY good will encourage a second opinion (OK — in an emergency, this may not be true)…. if I had not insisted on a second opinion, I would have ended up getting chemo for cancer, when I didn’t really have cancer. (And by the way — that was after I was told by my oncologist that what I had was so rare, “No one will know anymore about it than I do!” Don’t get me started on what an egotistical SOB he really was.)
You can see why I was so excited, then, to find the editorial in the New York Times….
And my kudos to Bruce McAuley, M.D. the letter writer. He said what needed to be said by an MD. He’s done many patients a huge favor, and perhaps saved them from the wrong treatment or a misdiagnosis.
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