To wonder whether gaslighting is part of the UK medical curriculum?

I think they know thats why they leave the country or practicing altogether

Yes, they're equally as thick and lazy. Patients are just seen faster and the waiting room won't be filled with people.

My first dh went to the doctors with worrying neurological signs. I went with him because I was concerned dh would play them down. The doctor examined him and said he had a virus. I calmly queried about the neuro signs (I was a qualified nurse) and he took great delight in putting me in my place. Dh had been to that surgery several times over the preceeding weeks about increasingly bad pain in his neck and shoulder. Wasn't properly diagnosed or investigated of course.

24 hours later, I had to call back because dh was losing the function in his legs. The same doctor came to the house and panicked because he knew something was seriously wrong. His attitude towards me completely changed. Dh was sent to hospital and the next day to another hospital where an MRI revealed a tumour compressing his spinal cord in his lower neck. He had decompression surgery, but sadly died a year later as it was cancerous.

everyone saying to ‘go private’ thinking its the land of milk and honey realises its the same NHS trained doctors using the same CKS/NICE/NHS guidelines don’t they?

i think so.
Ive recently stopped working in the care industry. Some peoples stories about symptoms being dismissed with disasterous consequences have made me so scared of the state of the nhs in general, but particularly about being fobbed off and dismissed

Yes, in reality it’s terrifying how little cross checking they seem to do. I do all this for myself with help from my spouse, but it scares me for those who are not necessarily up to the (large) task, especially if chronically unwell, or who don’t have significant help. There must be so much avoidable harm being done.

I often wonder if medical professionals have any idea that there’s a huge cohort of patients who have absolutely no trust in them whatsoever. You would like to think it would make them up their game but sadly so many exist in their little god complex bubble that they probably don’t care.

Yes you are totally right op and it’s not a recent thing, I first experienced it 53 years ago.
What also concerns me is that all medical people seem to operate in isolation and not actually look at your medical notes. I’ve been given medication that shouldn’t be taken with my current medication; but GP seems totally unaware of the fact that I was in anything.

I think you may be right. My son last year suffered from a particular eye infection and the only place that could treat him was the eye hospital. First time he had it (last year) all was well, they gave him a specific treatment it cleared up. Christmas time it started again, I booked in with the optician who agreed it was the same problem and referred him for an emergency appointment at the hospital which we waited 2 months nearly. At this point my son was rubbing his eyes all day everyday for that length of time amongst other issues and when I sae the consultant he told me he has eczema on his eye lid. I was furious, I challenged him and he sniped back at me and told me if I paid attention to my child I may notice he has eczema elsewhere!? I was mortified. So I went back to the GP same week got re referred again back to the hospital, thankfully saw someone else and lonely behold he had the same problem with his eyes he had a year previously. So my son had to suffer with awful symptoms for nearly 3 months by the time he received treatment. And why!? It could've been dealt with then and there. The system is broken and private healthcare is nothing but a mere dream in terms of affordability so where does that leave us as a society. I'm sorry about your daughter OP I hope she's recovering well

What reply did you mean? Honestly, the quote button isn't that difficult to find... 🙄

If you meant my reply about over egging symptoms that are concerning (symptoms of cancer, for example), it could be the difference between a 2 week referral and a 6 month referral. For clarity, I'm not suggesting entirely inventing symptoms (obviously).

My DH presented at multiple GP appointments with clinical signs needing investigation- was told multiple times it was hemorrhoids and to stop bothering the busy Doctors.

10 years on a pro active nurse practitioner ordered blood tests resulting in an emergency iron infusion and a colonoscopy. He had stage 3 colon cancer requiring emergency surgery, months of pre and past op chemo that has left him permanently disabled with a billion to one side effect.

Not quite the same but recently I had an GP telephone appointment with a pharmacist re HRT.
I am on the lowest dose and I asked for my dose to be increased, I listed my reasons, certain health markers are declining, which I researched and found they are all recognised as being affected by low oestrogen.
I have stomach fat, an area which never used to carry fat and which will not shift no matter what I try and I am trying hard, again a low oestrogen issue.
The pharmacist told me that unless my night sweats and hot flushes were getting worse she wouldn’t raise my prescription due to the risk of breast cancer (no family history, no elevated risk).
I have never had sweats or flushes but that seems to be the only symptom she recognised, none of the other known symptoms I listed to her counted.

The kicker - she told me that everybody puts weight on when they get older.

I wish I’d asked why the BMI chart doesn’t change once you are over 45 in that case.

edit- when I mentioned fatigue, again a well known menopause symptom she told me to make an appointment with a GP.

My husband failed to recover following a heart attack and subsequent stents. I phoned for an ambulance 5 times, kept being told his heart was fine. I could see he was dying. Eventually a foreign locum who was working below his pay Grade happend to be passing while we were in a and e and asked about the history. He instantly recognised pericarditis which is often fatal. He didn't give up until someone took it seriously and a large amount of fluid was drained. DH owes his life to that guy.

Yes, I've only once in my life been treated with respect by doctors, and that was in intensive care. I almost never went to the doctor - once every 3-4 years - and basically every time I was treated as a time wasting hypochondriac, whatever the issue. I honestly found it so weird - what a strange conclusion to draw! I think there's something really odd going on with the NHS.

So I haven't gone at all now since 2019. I order my own tests and pay for treatment out of pocket in the rare cases I need such things - a UTI or a B12 issue or something. I'll go to the doctors when I'm dying, and that's it.

I don't need some random man implying I'm an hysterical fantasist wasting taxpayers money - that's not a thing I need to schedule into my day. 😂

Yes 100%. My adult child is forever short because the second opinion refused to accept or repeat his original test, suggesting it it was only one result (no, it was the long one over a day); it wasn’t a fasting one (it was) and relied on ‘ I trust Mr X implicitly’. Also my mum had to pay privately to get a diagnosis which led to half her children and grandchildren then being diagnosed after being fobbed off by the GP. It’s endemic.

Much much less serious than some of the misdiagnoses posted here but I presented at my GP reporting having swallowed a fish bone and my throat being in horrible pain. The GP told me it was viral and sent me home with some stronger painkillers. Three days later a locum heard my symptoms and immediately rang ENT and it was out of my throat shortly after. Utterly ridiculous. I am taking out private health insurance next month. Quite a bit will be excluded as I do have several pre existing conditions but at least going forward I can have anything new seen to quickly by people who aren't just thinking about the cheapest way to do stuff.

chronic underfunding and underresourcing, which leads to doctors at all levels twisting themselves into pretzels to insist that the patient’s condition is due to something that doesn’t cost money to fix - even when they know damn well that it isn’t the case, they can at least delay committing to expensive treatment, or better still, avoid being the one responsible for it

Bingo. That’s responsible for the majority. Unless you are responsible for a clinical budget or ploughing through waiting lists, you can’t comprehend the pressure.

So, the first line of defence is limited tests. If you actually sent every patient for an MRI, who realistically should have one to diagnose/rule in or out, you would be put out on your ear within 5 seconds. Similarly, the only way to even hope to get within a stratosphere of acceptable metrics for waiting lists (esp surgical) is not to put people on them.

OP has a valid point, however is pointing the finger at the wrong people. Don’t have a go at clinical staff who, as the above poster put it, literally have to tie themselves in knots to ‘make’ a condition fit something that will not cost $$ or blow out metrics further by diagnosing or treating. The finger needs to be pointed at the political level who hold responsibility for funding.

This is a sobering read and I am so sorry to everyone to have had such poor expierences with their GPs

Sorry quote button failed my side.

Okay, thanks for clarifying, I apologise!

No to PP above