Pico de Orizaba

Pico de Orizaba
Taken from Huatusco, Veracruz, the closest town to Margarita's family's ranch.

Saturday, March 28, 2015

Second Opinions for Avoiding Medical Malpractice...

What is a "second opinion" and what is a "medical malpractice"?  Must we pay for another doctor for a second opinion?  Must we await for someone to lose their sight or a vital organ or the ability for them to use their mind or for them to lose all of their money in surgeries and medication or for them to die and then for the court of law to determine against the medical practitioner for a truly bad medical experience to have been "medical malpractice"?  Must we live our lives that way?  Must we lose that time and that energy and that money and that life, if we could have done it differently?

I still have my gallbladder 9 years after having been warned that I must remove it to prevent a medical emergency.  Today I have an uninflamed gallbladder free of gallstones... no thanks to doctors; no thanks to pharmaceuticals; no thanks to a surgery I couldn't afford at the time.  

Today we went to the park to walk (Margarita ran the 3.1 miles Nicolas and I walked) and I started having pain in my left ankle and my right knee... similar to what happened 2.5 years ago I connected with my Vitamin D deficiency.  However, what I've been reading, and that Jenny mentioned a year ago, is that Magnesium is responsible for the synthesis of vitamin D into a usable hormone in the kidneys... We brought a blanket and books to the park. Yesterday I downloaded two E-Books from the ReMag website (the Magnesium "supplement" Jenny uses for her MTHFR gene mutation) and brought the one on Magnesium with me. Dr. Carolyn Dean MD, ND http://drcarolyndean.com/ explains that beta blockers, like Statins cause a deficiency in both Magnesium and
CoEnzyme Q10 (and I just realized that I didn't ask you to purchase that... what is most necessary in energy metabolism in the heart muscle; maybe I didn't find it without gluten...)  I'm going to look into the Beta Blockers and magnesium deficiency...

I'm also going to send you the e-book...  I suggest you read it just so you can have an idea what she says about magnesium deficiency and too much calcium.  There are a lot of doctors and scientists stating their opinions on Statins...  But, you must ask where they get their information for stating these opinions.  And why would they lie...? So many doctors from around the world explaining how they went from prescribing Statins to the decision to stop pushing statins on their patients... Opinions.  And they mention scientific studies published in very prestigious scientific journals such as "the doctors..." or "Lancet" or "The New England..." or... that claim negligent benefits from Statins and not enough for outweighing the side-effects...

But, when Pfizer earns $10billion per year just on Lipitor (what my cardiologist prescribed me), they have a ton of money for lobbying, visiting doctors and giving them a free lunch, paying publicity, bribing the FDA to look the other way (on exaggerations), giving nice gifts to research scientists and for altering outcomes and criticism of those outcomes... Afterall, when it is pharmaceutical, it is private business and they must answer to their shareholders... meaning that their stocks MUST rise.  This isn't just my opinion.  It is information repeated by many highly respected and awarded doctors, scientists and science journalists...  Opinion... Everyone has an opinion, even the scientists... even the CEOs of Merck... But, the question is, how much of those opinions are based on truth or based on need... for "towing the line", for being "politically correct", for increasing company value?  And, as I'm sure you will agree, I don't have the background for researching the truth behind what these highly respected people are saying... And, if we had to investigate all of the information that we read (for instance, in the newspapers) to believe that they are not leaving out information, warping information, exaggerating or lying, then we wouldn't open a newspaper EVER...  How can you verify the truth behind anything you read or hear?  


Because a style of healthcare is popular and followed by so many doctors, doesn't make it's the correct proceedure.  If you read the beginning of the Dr. Dean piece and if you read Gary Taubes and if you read Edu Erasmus (never cited by anyone of the new critics, which I find strange... or maybe they consider him old school) you will read the same thing:

In medical school "they" did not teach us health or nutrition (we know no more about what to eat than does the average person).  They just taught us illness.  And what they taught us is that illness has two treatments; 1) medication;
2) surgery.  


And another thing you will read repeatedly is that ost medical schools are highly funded by the pharmaceutical corporations; that they have a vested interest in the medical students learning about using the drugs they sell.  And, since magnesium and other natural means of maintaining health canNOT be patented, there is no money in that for the pharmaceuticals.  What's most important is that curing the patient is bad for company revenues and stock building...  Health does NOT sell.  Illness sells, especially if you can keep the person alive and medicated... for a lifetime.

"Ross, you are hypertensive.  Hypertension is for life.  It has no symptoms.  Meaning that you can feel perfectly fine and still be on the verge of having a heart attack.  So, this means that you must take medication for managing your hypertension... FOR LIFE." 


That's what the cardiologist told me 2+ years ago.  Who taught him that mantra and why?  The most recent cardiologist told me that I am NOT hypertensive.  Who's wrong?  


The most recent cardiologist told me I must take Aspirin for the rest of my life.  There is a whole lot of information that claims that Aspirin therapy actually is unrecommendable due to its risk of causing hemorages and peptic ulcers... Now, if you think about FAP/Gardners and our risk of cancer in the stomach or the duodenum and if you understand that having stomach ulcers greatly increases your risk of developing cancer... must I continue?  But, there are medications for the peptic ulcers, such as proton pump inhibitors, that also greatly increase stomach cancer in FAP patients...

And, no, this is not opinion.  This is based upon scientific research. No, it is not my scientific research.  I'm not a research scientist... But, I spend much more time looking up scientific research than do you and, I imagine many doctors, since they don't have the time.  I don't have the option.

But, what has occured is that all of the doctors with whom I've visited over the past year (1 cardiologist, 1 gastroenterologist and 1 endocrinologist) have claimed that my understanding of diet and health has greatly improved my health in ways the don't see with their patients...  If it had been up to them, I would have been on a whole bunch of unnecessary prescription drugs, although they claim that they wouldn't change a thing I've done with my research based diet over the past year.  But, truthfully, it is not up to them.  It's up to me.  It's my body and I will protect it from the irresponsibility of a doctor. 


Do you think that's being unreasonable?  But, how many times have you heard about asking for second opiniones?  How many times have you read about medical malpractice? Isn't it correct that what I'm doing is "getting a second opinion" for avoiding the best I can "medical malpractice"?

Remember, I still have my Gallbladder...

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