"If you've been diagnosed with cancer, you may have dozens, if not hundreds, of questions," says Harold J. Burstein, MD, an oncologist at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, USA. But the moment you're in the doctor's office, it's easy to forget everything you wanted to know about your treatment.
Make the most of your visit to the doctor. Prepare yourself. To make this task easier for you, here is a list of questions you can ask your doctor about the disease and treatment.
1.What kind of cancer do I have? At what stage?
2.How common is this type of cancer?
3.How will my illness progress in the future?
4.What treatments are there for this type of cancer?
5.Are these cancer treatments approved or experimental?
6.What can I expect from treatment? How long does it last? How will I feel?
7.What side effects or complications may occur as a result of treatment?
8.In addition to cancer treatment, will I need to take other medications? If yes, for how long and what kind?
9. Do I need to change my diet and lifestyle before starting treatment?
You will also want to inquire about the doctor's qualifications. In fact, it is important to know whether the doctor is competent in treating a given disease. Here are some questions to ask before starting treatment.
1.What experience do you have in treating this type of cancer?
2.How many people with this type of cancer have you treated in the past year?
3.Do you have a certificate? If yes, in what specialty?
4.Do you have any other relevant qualifications?
5. Do you collaborate with other specialists and medical professionals who could be part of my team of specialists?
6.What clinics do you cooperate with?
7.Are clinical trials conducted at this center? If not, where are they held in the region?
8.Can you recommend another doctor to get his opinion?
You may feel uncomfortable asking your doctor about his experience. But doctors expect these questions, and even welcome them. Doctors want patients to feel comfortable and confident, and not intimidated.
How to Make the Most of Your Doctor's Visit
During your first visits to the doctor, it will be difficult to keep track of all the details. You will have too much information - names of doctors, names of drugs and cancer treatments, and, inevitably, a fair dose of medical jargon. Here are some ways to make the most of your visits.
Take notes. Always take a notepad with you to take notes. "You can even take a tape recorder with you so you can listen to the entire conversation again at home," says Terry Ades, director of cancer information at the American Cancer Society in Atlanta, USA.
.Take a helper with you. A friend or loved one can provide moral support during a stressful conversation. But it can also play an important practical role. He can remember details that you simply cannot perceive because you are depressed. It will remind you to ask important questions that you forgot about.
.Ask if your doctor has literature you can take home with you. Before you leave, ask your doctor if he has literature about your type of cancer or treatments he recommends. It will be extremely helpful if you have something to read at home when you are not in the stressful environment of the doctor's office.
.Get the doctor's phone number. Chances are, as soon as you get home, you will remember many questions you wanted to ask. So always ask your doctor for his business card, says Jean C. Buckner, MD, director of medical oncology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, USA. Find out how you can contact your doctor or nurse in the office with questions that come up next.
Eliseeva Medical Center provides medical care using bioresonance diagnostic methods ( vegetative resonance diagnostics, vegetative resonance testing) and treatment ( frequency therapy, bioresonance therapy, induction therapy) and methods comprehensive cleansing of the body for more than 10 years.
During this time, the doctors of our center have accumulated extensive experience working with patients suffering from a wide range of pathologies. We are well aware of not only the difficulties in diagnosing and treating diseases, but also the problems in the interaction between doctor and patient, which are sometimes caused by incomplete mutual understanding.
The process of communication between patient and doctor does not always go smoothly. This is primarily due to the fact that, as a rule, the patient is not very well versed in medical problems, and the doctor does not always think about the fact that some specific aspects of diagnosis and treatment, which seem absolutely clear to him, may present significant difficulties for the patient to understand .
In a situation of incomplete mutual understanding between the doctor and the patient, it is extremely important that during the conversation the most important aspects of the diagnosis and treatment of his disease are touched upon and explained to the patient. To facilitate the process of obtaining the necessary information, the patient should prepare in advance for the conversation with the doctor. We bring to the attention of patients a list of questions that must be asked to the doctor during the appointment. In addition, we want to immediately answer some of these questions.
1 question. What do you think caused my illness?
2. Question. Did one or more reasons cause my disease?
Answer. Since when vegetative resonance diagnostics A comprehensive examination of the body takes place, all factors influencing the development of diseases (diseases) in the patient will be identified.
3. Question. What examination methods should be used to identify all the causes of my disease?
Answer. Our center uses vegetative resonance diagnostics (vegetative resonance testing), which in the vast majority of cases is capable of providing comprehensive diagnostic information. However, if necessary, our doctors will recommend other tests.
4. Question. How accurately are the proposed studies able to identify the causes of the disease?
Answer. The accuracy of the method we use is about 86%. If necessary, the doctor will recommend other examination methods necessary for this situation.
5. Question. How safe are the studies being conducted?
Answer. Vegetative resonance testing (vegetative resonance diagnostics) absolutely safe. The examination is carried out without pain, blood or radiation.
6. Question. What is the prognosis for the course of the disease? How will the disease develop with and without treatment?
Answer. The prognosis of the course of the disease and the possible influence of certain treatment methods on it will be determined by the doctor based on the results vegetative resonance testing.
7. Question. What treatment options are there for my condition? How effective is the proposed treatment? What is the benefit-risk ratio of the proposed treatment?
8. Question. If my symptoms get worse, what should I do?
Answer. For complete treatment, regular monitoring of its effectiveness by the attending physician is necessary. Our patients, as a rule, are under close supervision of a specialist, which allows us to promptly detect unfavorable trends in the course of the disease and take the necessary measures.
9. Question. How aware are you of the specific effects of the medications I use? Is there a possibility of adverse interactions between these medications and newly prescribed medications?
Answer. The doctors of our center have specialization not only in the field vegetative resonance diagnostics And bioresonance therapy, but also therapy and other areas of medicine. Therefore, the side effects of drugs are well known to them. The methods we use in no way interact adversely with medications the patient is already taking. Moreover, the use bioresonance methods treatment, comprehensive cleansing of the body helps reduce the need for medications.
10. Question. Should we constantly monitor the side effects of prescribed medications?
Answer. Yes. But this applies to medications prescribed in other medical institutions. Used by us frequency therapy, bioresonance therapy, homeopathy, comprehensive body cleansing do not have any significant side effects.
Oncologist is a doctor who specializes in treating cancer. However, this is not just a person prescribing one of the methods of antitumor treatment. An oncologist is a specialist who takes a comprehensive approach to patients with malignant tumors in order to help them live as long and comfortably as possible in each specific situation.
The first and most important thing to do if you are faced with an oncological diagnosis is to spend time finding a competent and qualified specialist who will use all his skills, knowledge and professional experience to help you cope with the disease. Because it is the oncologist who will become part of your family for some time. An oncologist with whom you will have mutual trust and respect is already half the success in the fight against cancer.
Questions about your condition:
There are more than 300 different ones. Therefore, by understanding what type of cancer you have and how far it has spread, you can better understand what is wrong with you and what kind of help you need.
4 main questions:
- ?
When you walk into a doctor's office for a checkup, there is a chance that you will experience a lot of stress and pressure - such is the way people react to doctors. In this case, most likely, you will expect that the doctor will ask you questions and you will answer them. But your health is extremely important, and your life may depend on whether you ask your doctor something or remain silent. Maybe you don't need the surgery you're being booked for. And is it really necessary to take these particular medications?
“Do I really need this examination?”
Doctors very often adhere to the philosophy of safety, and most often they care about their own safety, so they order as many examinations as possible only in order to have grounds for protection in the event of a lawsuit being filed against them. Eighty percent of biopsies are negative, causing people to risk their health and experience severe pain just to keep the doctor safe. Doctors also abuse CT scanning, and the radiation from it causes about six thousand cases of cancer a year.
“Where would you send your wife and children?”
By law, health care workers must treat all patients equally. However, everyone understands that some people still receive better treatment than others. General practitioners most often refer their patients to government agencies with which they collaborate, although they themselves most likely visit completely different specialists.
“How many surgeries do you perform per year?”
Nowhere is the saying that practice makes perfect more applicable than in the operating room. For example, after visiting a urologist who performs more than forty surgeries a year, you will be 50 percent less likely to experience complications. Thus, it turns out that your health depends entirely on the experience of the surgeon.
“Can we schedule the surgery for the morning?”
If your surgery is early, you will receive the undivided attention of anxious medical staff. Studies of more than ninety thousand operations have shown that those patients who were operated on in the morning had fewer complications from both the process itself and the anesthesia.
“If I go to the hospital, will you visit me?”
Over the past few years, the number of medical institutions that provide exclusively consulting services or inpatient care has grown from several hundred to almost twenty thousand. So if you need hospitalization after a visit to such a doctor, you can be sure that it will not be him who will treat you. And your new doctor will not know anything about your medical history. Therefore, you should make sure in advance that the doctor who conducts the examination also becomes your attending physician.
“Do you receive a bonus based on your performance?”
Before planning treatment or surgery at a particular hospital, check what exactly the hospital's doctors are encouraged to do. Since many hospitals pay doctors a premium and provide various bonuses not for the quality of treatment, but for how quickly the doctor can get rid of his patient. As a result, it turns out that the quality of medical care is sacrificed to increase patient turnover.
“When did you graduate from medical school?”
Research has shown that doctors who graduated from their medical school more than twenty years ago are less likely to follow modern, innovative treatments and are more likely to adhere to their established views on medicine. If you don’t want to ask such questions directly in person, then there are various verification methods, including via the Internet.
"What is written here?"
Doctors' bad handwriting is not just a stereotype. It is responsible for approximately 61 percent of all incorrectly dispensed medications and more than one and a half million complications per year. So if you can't read your doctor's prescription, your pharmacist probably won't be able to either. Therefore, the best solution is to ask your doctor to print out the names of the medications he prescribes for you.
“Will you take off your wedding ring?”
When scientists analyzed the hands of sixty-six nurses, they found that those who wore wedding rings had ten times more bacteria on their hands than those who did not. Bacterial infections are the leading cause of death in hospitals, with about a hundred thousand people dying from them every year. And this means that you can pick up a secondary infection already in the hospital, that is, you will get a disease that you did not have before visiting the clinic.
“What else can I do to heal?”
Research shows that a proper diet and regular exercise are essential for the treatment and prevention of a wide range of diseases and conditions, from heart attack to prostate cancer. However, only one in six doctors discuss the positive impact of proper nutrition on health and specific disease with their patients. Moreover, only 28 percent of doctors talk about exercise when talking to their patients. Naturally, not all doctors are nutritionists and can offer you the right course of physical activity. But you can be sure that he definitely knows someone who is well versed in this and can help you with it. Therefore, you can ask a doctor in any field of activity about this.
The doctor is obliged to answer in detail all questions asked by the patient, and these answers must be specific and presented in understandable language. If, after asking a question, the patient does not understand the answer, he should not hesitate to ask for a more understandable explanation. Targeted scientific research has shown that patients who are well informed about their treatment are not only less likely to be dissatisfied with their interactions with medicine, but also simply recover faster.
To ask questions- this is a form of exercising one’s right to informed voluntary consent, and answering them is the professional responsibility of the medical worker involved in treatment (doctor, consultant, nurse, administrator).
So, let's ask the doctor questions.
1. What surgery do you recommend for me? Ask your doctor to explain the surgery. If you plan to remove or restore something in the body, clarify why this is necessary. To better explain the meaning of the intervention, surgeons often make drawings (diagrams) for patients to illustrate what, how and why will be carried out. Since there are always several methods of surgical intervention for the same disease (including those with different traumatic effects), it is worth asking why, out of several available, the surgeon chose the one that is offered to you.
2. Why do I need surgery? It is clear that there must be serious reasons for carrying out the operation. Some operations are designed to reduce or eliminate pain symptoms. Others are aimed at eliminating unpleasant symptoms or disruption of the normal functioning of organs. There are operations whose purpose is to clarify the diagnosis. The surgeon is obliged to explain to the patient the purpose of the operation. Make sure you understand how surgery will solve your health problem.
3. What are the alternatives to surgery?(in other words, can I be treated non-surgically)? Surgery is not always the only treatment option.
Medicines and other non-surgical procedures in some cases can help the patient more or less significantly. You must find out what the risks are with non-surgical treatment and how much risk there is with surgical treatment.
The more you know about the pros and cons of different treatments for your case, the better you can make a decision.
But the final decision about what method of treatment will be made by you.
There is another approach - observation, during which the patient, together with the doctor, monitors the dynamics of the development of the disease over time. If the patient gets worse over time, the need for surgical treatment may become more obvious; if it gets better, it becomes possible to postpone it, possibly for a very long time.
4. What positive effect is expected to be obtained from the operation? It is necessary to find out the answer to the question of what the operation will give.
The next essential question is How long will the expected positive effect from the operation last?
For some situations, the effect of surgical treatment is quite short-lived, for others it is a cure for life, for others, repeated surgery is required after some time.
When discussing the expected effect of surgery, it is worth being realistic. Patients often expect a lot from a surgeon and end up unsatisfied.
5. What is the risk to my health and life from the proposed surgery?
Any surgical intervention carries a risk of complications and side effects. That is why it is always necessary, together with your doctor, to weigh the balance between the risk and the expected positive result.
Complications can occur before surgery, immediately during surgery, and after it. Complications are unplanned, sometimes hardly predictable situations, such as reactions to anesthesia (narcosis), excessive blood loss, infection, damage to nearby organs, etc.
Some patients have an inherently increased risk of certain complications due to the characteristics of their concomitant diseases and (or) the drug therapy they receive. Experts can (and should) foresee most complications.
It is necessary to directly ask questions about possible complications during the operation and possible problems after it.
First of all, the patient should be aware of the extent to which he may experience postoperative pain and by what means this pain will be reduced. It is known that preventing pain during surgery and minimizing it after it not only alleviates the difficult psychological state of the patient, but also contributes to his rapid recovery.
6. What happens if I decide not to have surgery?
Having detailed information about the risks and expected benefits of surgery, you have the right to decide whether to refuse medical intervention.
In this case, it is worth asking the surgeon about what are the expected consequences for the body in the event of such a refusal?. Will the pain be stronger, will the course of the disease and your condition worsen, will the existing problems go away on their own (without surgical intervention)?
7. Where can I get a second opinion regarding the need and type of surgery?
Obtaining a second opinion, that is, a professional judgment on your medical situation by another competent specialist, is an effective means for the patient to get rid of
a) from the inevitable subjectivity of one, even a very competent, doctor;
b) from his material interest in carrying out the operation.
It is clear that you should agree to surgery only in cases where it is really necessary.
However, it’s no secret that surgeons love their work and strive to operate more , and in situations where this work is also paid by the piece, the desire to operate a lot can become significant and therefore unsafe.
For this reason, in modern (so far foreign) health insurance programs, obtaining a second opinion by the patient is provided as a mandatory component of medical care paid for by the insurance company.
In Russia, you can get it for free by using your right to a consultation.
Keep in mind that in order to avoid repeated examinations, the specialist who will give you a second opinion must provide as much information as possible about the results of previously performed diagnostics (outpatient and inpatient medical records, radiographs, etc.).
8. What is the experience of a particular surgeon in performing this type of surgery?
The best way to minimize the risk of surgery is to choose a surgeon who a) has extensive experience performing this type of surgery in the past,
b) currently performs this type of operation quite often (at least 100 operations per year).
In civilized countries, information about the number of specific operations performed by each surgeon and the frequency of their positive results and complications is open. It’s different for now, but it’s not at all in the interests of patients.
It is clear that it is still unusual to ask such questions directly to the surgeon. However, since “the stake is no less than life,” the head of the department or the deputy chief physician for medical work can (and, in accordance with the law, is obliged to) provide such information to the patient.
9. Where is the best place to have surgery?
The most important question. Remember how actively the question was discussed - where (and who?!) The first President of Russia will be operated on.
It has already been said more than once that not only individual doctors, but (sometimes, first of all) medical institutions differ significantly in their capabilities.
It is known that It is best to have surgery in clinics that have maximum experience in this type of surgery. y, for whom such is a daily routine (even if it is open heart surgery) work.
Therefore, if they offer to perform an operation and, apparently, it really needs to be done, it is not a fact that it needs to be done in the medical institution where the conversation is being held with the patient about it.
10. What type of pain relief (anesthesia, anesthesia) is needed in my case?
Anesthesia during surgery can be general (anesthesia), regional (some part of the body is anesthetized, for example, an arm, a leg, while, unlike anesthesia, consciousness can be preserved), local.
With local anesthesia the immediate area of intervention is anesthetized, for example, by introducing novocaine or its more modern analogues into the tissues of the surgical field.
Each type of anesthesia has its own advantages and disadvantages. Since issues of pain during and after surgery, as well as issues of safety of pain management directly affect the patient, they must be discussed with both the surgeon and the anesthesiologist, who is responsible for this section of the work.
The qualifications of the anesthesiologist are no less important for the success of the operation than the qualifications of the surgeon, which is why the mandatory participation of the anesthesiologist in obtaining the informed voluntary consent of the patient for a specific type of anesthesia is provided.
The anesthesiologist should ask questions about the risks and possible side effects of the proposed type of anesthesia. It is extremely important for the anesthesiologist to obtain information from the patient about the medications he is constantly taking, facts of intolerance to certain drugs, and allergic reactions to them in the past.
11. How long will it take to return to normal after surgery?
Your surgeon should tell you what sensations you may experience during and after the operation, and what you can (and cannot) do in the first hours, days, months after surgery.
Ask a question about how long you will stay in the hospital. Find out whether you will need any support devices or devices immediately after surgery (and especially at home).
Ask how quickly you can return to your usual physical activity and work activities. You should learn about the factors that may be hindering your recovery.
For example, what weights you should not lift and for how long after surgery. Ask what you can do to make recovery as fast as possible.
12. How much might it cost?
One of the most pressing questions. Depending on the payment system for medical care the patient receives services in (compulsory insurance, voluntary insurance, budget, paid services), his financial participation in ensuring the quality of care may be different. It is advisable to get answers to at least three questions:
34. What services and medications are guaranteed through insurance or budget funds?
35. What services and medications must the patient pay for?
36. What paid services and medications should be supplemented with examination and treatment to achieve the best result?
It is better to ask these questions not only to the surgeon, but also to an expert from your insurance company, which is obliged to protect your insurance interests, the purpose of which is to minimize the client’s costs if he needs to receive quality medical care.
There is one more question, but it arises when it becomes clear that everything went well - how to thank specialists for quality work?
You can get an answer to this question not only from fellow patients, the health workers themselves, but also by referring to the legal norms of the “doctor-patient” relationship (see www.defender.spb.ru: “People and healthcare: rules of the game. A manual for patients and their relatives").
G.Ya. Lopatenkov. Patient's rights.
