seeing a doctor in the US for long term health problems

[ruckus49]

Has anyone in the US seen their physician for a long term problem like high blood pressure, anxiety, diabetes, etc. and NOT been prescribed a drug? I've never had a physician spend more than 10 minutes analyzing me before they confidently assert that I take the prescription route. The serious side effects of these drugs are well known, but it is a quick and easy fix for the doctor. Not working out? A follow up appt. only requires an adjustment of the dose. Still not working out? "Well this other drug has shown some positive results for my other patients." Continue this pattern for years without making any progress.

Considering I don't know one person that I would consider healthy, have we all just given up on taking the natural way to health? Everyone sleeps too little, eats too much processed food, not enough veggies, is stressed and/or depressed, and barely gets exercise. But these are only modest suggestions for our doctors, so I don't see them any more unless I'm seriously sick.

So what do we do? We go online and try to find advice to combat these health problems without prescription drugs. What's funny is that at the end of every page they tell you not to take their advice without consulting your doctor first. So we're left to choose from our doctors, heavily influenced by Rx marketing teams, or some impersonal and possibly unreliable advice from the net. I pay $372 a month for "the highest quality healthcare in the world," as we are continually told by pundits and the media, and this is what we get. The documentary Forks Over Knives has a lot of insight into this issue of quick to prescribe doctors coupled with unhealthy habits. What do you guys think of these problems? I don't see any way out. I don't even think the increasing ubiquity of organic food will be able to combat this. I just see increasingly poor health for our society over the next few decades.

[bigfootspartan]

Depends on the doc you're seeing. There's actually great guidelines around hypertension, diabetes and high cholesterol (up here anyways) which recommend using lifestyle modification before trying medications, depending on the severity of the problem.

Problem is, most doc's I've worked are pretty disenchanted by people. Imagine practicing for 20 years and out of everyone who you told "increase your exercise and eat healthier, here are some ideas" only a small percentage actually tried those things. Nowadays most people expect a quick fix. When we say "work on diet and exercise" most people just keep on with the same, or maybe add a salad every two weeks and come back and say "it didn't work, I guess I need the medication."

Also, it's not like we get paid to write prescriptions (here anyways). I always find it funny when people say things like "doctors are in the pocket of big pharma... ZOMG!!!" We certainly do get influenced by the marketing. Probably the best example of that is the whole "free samples" thing, drug companies usually provide offices with free drug samples, so then docs give them out to the poorer people in the practice. Then, once the samples run out the people usually keep up with the more expensive newer drugs since they know "they work for them." Otherwise however, every doctor I've worked with prescribes based on the evidence behind the drug and not the marketing around the drug.

Edit: Sorry just re-read your post and realized I was a bit off key. Honestly the best things you can do for yourself are:
1. Quit smoking cigarettes if you do smoke them.
2. Exercise 0.5-1 hrs 4-7 days a week.
3. Try to eat as healthy as you can. Looking at the DASH diet is a good idea, it's the only diet which was actually validated by evidence and studies.

If you do all three of those things I can guarantee your risk of any significant health problem will decrease a ton. I have seen the occasional person with diabetes mellitus type 2 in the earlystages who did all three of those and doesn't need any medication anymore. It's just that most people won't do that.

[nowaysj]

Ruckus, if you are really sick, you are just fucked, it's right there, there is nothing really beyond that.

I've got 4 docs, and all of them are totally clueless. If you don't have a bog standard condition, these mental midgets just slough it off, and prescribe something in the ball park of your symptoms. Was prescribed a medication earlier this year, that necessitated a three hour, $12,000 trip to the ER. It is fucking jokes. Afterwards, doc, prescribed something similar, with nearly the same consequences. Of all these prescriptions, the most tolerable has been Vicodin, Atenlol, and hydrochlorothiazide.

But the bottom line is it is your body. You're the only one who can really care for it. Diet, exercise and sleep really are the keys to at least maintaining a basic healthy body. If you have ailments that prevent you from achieving a balance in any of those three, you're going to be kinda fucked.

And quite seriously, and with one hundred percent sincerity, I've started taking medical marijuana, and it is ASTONISHINGLY helpful, without the NASTY side effects of the pills those lab coated retards will try to push on you. Mmj obviously can't treat every particular ailment, but it can help greatly with sleep, and can majorly help with exercise, in that it can reduce pain and inflammation allowing for a much more active lifestyle. It can wreck your diet if you are taking a particularly munchy strain, but you've just got to deal with that, so self control. But with mmj helping in these areas, your body will regain strength and vitality, hopefully at least partially addressing whatever specific ailment you have.

Mmj has helped restore my life, a life I literally thought I had lost.