A Real Health Care Crisis
Since it’s safe to assume that most readers of this column are regular Internet users, I am asking you to come clean about one of the web’s dirtiest little secrets. I am talking about IIH – Internet Induced Hypochondria. I may have coined the term myself, but don’t pretend you have no idea what I’m talking about. We’ve all experienced it. There are millions of sufferers out there. It’s an epidemic that knows no racial, ethnic or sexual boundaries. You don’t even have to be a classic hypochondriac in the Woody Allen mold. In fact, for those who’ve never experienced hypochondria, the danger is far greater, because they have no immunity.
IIH starts innocently enough with a mild but annoying symptom (let’s say a stomach ache), that doesn’t resolve itself as quickly as the sufferer (still living in blissful ignorance) hopes. She tries the usual remedies, but the condition either persists, returns, or isn’t fully resolved. It’s not (yet) something painful or debilitating enough to necessitate the hassle and expense of a doctor’s appointment, which the patient hopes to avoid by using the wondrous tool of our modern age, now effortlessly at her disposal. Wary of crackpots and modern day snake oil salesmen who pollute even the wisest search engines, our intrepid self-healer limits herself to reputable medical sites. As she peruses mayoclinic.com, she feels empowered, invigorated, and even slightly virtuous. Not only is she taking charge of her own health care, she’s also doing her part not to squander the resources of our overburdened health care system.
In an effort to be precise about her symptoms, she answers a series of online diagnostic questions. In what part of the abdomen is the stomach ache located? Is the pain sharp or a dull ache? Intermittent or continuous? How long has she had it? Is it isolated, or (and here’s where the trouble really begins) accompanied by any of the following symptoms…? You all know where this is heading, and so, in all likelihood, does the patient. But here’s the insidious part of IIH – self-awareness of the twisted path you are being led down will do you no good. If that stomachache is a dull ache, sometimes in tandem with upper leg pain, you may have a sluggish colon, uterine fibroids, or ovarian cancer.
By the time our well-intentioned patient has reached this point in her medical journey, it is usually well past the witching hour. The rest of the household is fast asleep. There is nothing to distract her from increasing her knowledge of each of these options. And what better way to do so than by perusing the countless forums frequented by her fellow sufferers? Inevitably she will find others with her exact symptoms! And thank goodness that she has, for this will allow her to avoid the mistakes made in their medical care. She will be able to print out a list of questions (better yet, demands) for the specialist she needs to make an appointment with at eight am tomorrow morning, for there is no time to waste. Some of these poor posters knew no better and adopted the wait and see approach favored by their uninformed physicians. She won’t dwell on the misfortunes that befell them. She is being proactive, for that is the only way to defeat the insidious disease that even now must be charting its deadly course inside her. She knows it. Because there are so many others just like her, who have generously and bravely shared their personal stories, so that she may be cured.
Now, it is nearly morning. For the sake of her immune system, she must catch a few hours sleep. Reluctantly, she shuts off the computer and closes her eyes. As she drifts off, she thinks back longingly to those few short hours before, when she naively believed she had a stomachache. She would give anything to go back to that simple, happy time when her healthy life stretched out before her with nothing more troublesome than an occasional sinus headache… Or is it???
Sheryl Longin is the author of Dorian Greyhound: A Novel and co-screenwriter of the movie Dick.
It’s NOT Hypochondria!
Reading these political blogs REALLY DOES give me high blood pressure, and PROBABLY WILL give me a heart attack!
Remember Catch-22? The malingerer in that book read the Reader’s Digest for the disease of the month. (“I am Joe’s sigmoid colon, and here’s how I can misbehave…”) And if any of you or your kids watch InuYasha on TV, this is how Kagome and her grandfather think up enough excuses to deal with her continual absences from school.
There is nothing new under the sun.
I’ve found that if I go to the doctor and trust their judgment, I usually end up without any relief. No offense to doctors out there, but I’ve found that primary care physicians don’t know squat about anything out of the ordinary, and treat just about everything with the “put some ice or hydrocortisone cream on it and walk it off” protocol. I’ve had to take my family and myself to dermatologists, ENT specialists, asthma specialists, and allergists just to find a doctor who knows what the hell they’re doing– but to even know where to start I’ve had to do research of my own on the internet. Getting competent medical attention for anything you can’t already identify, even common complaints like asthma, requires a six-month journey through several doctors. If you already know what’s wrong, it only takes a month or two. The internet is an invaluable tool in that regard.
What we have here is a strong case of self-induced paranoia coupled with egotistical arrogance on the part of man to think that there is a cure for every ailment under the sun.
“Not only is she taking charge of her own health care, she’s also doing her part not to squander the resources of our overburdened health care system.”
This is an implication of the Law of Demand. Scarcity drives prices in industries such as health care. Unfortunately, humans do not understand ‘knowledgable physicians’ are more scarce than Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster.
Oh, to return to the days of “Rub some grass on it” or “Toughen up” or when humans considered the ‘days to be lived’ as more scarce than the ‘knowledge of doctors’ charged with artificially prolonging lives by renderring faux remedies for suckers.
Also, a wonderful example of “I am Joe’s [insert vital organ here]” can be found in Choke by Chuck Palahniuk. Thanks for the reminder, Dr. Ellen.
Er, ka0s… your theory is in a little chaos yourself. I think the author of the article was being ironic in the sentence you quoted. Read twice before attacking, old fellow (or gal).
You forgot to mention the thoughts of future canonization in recognition of the life-affirming nobility of her struggle against terrible illness.
Perfect description of someone I know but who was already a hypochondriac for a long time before the Internet–like most women. The Internet just makes her much more efficient and alleviates the burden of using all those big heavy books. Of course this is the reason why women live longer than men.
The author’s sardonic argument would ring much closer to the truth if it included the constant bombardment of drug advertisements that we all must suffer from every form of media–print, radio, television, the internet and email spam–as the primary cause of the described paranoia.
Perhaps Mass Marketing Related Hysteria-Internet Corroborated Hypochondria, while quite cumbersome to say, would be a more descriptive name for the syndrome.
MMRH-ICH for short. Sounds like murrick. I know I just coined that one.
By the way, if anyone cares, I think I either have an abdominal hernia or testicular cancer. I haven’t decided which one but I probably wont get it checked either way until I can no longer walk–like most men.
-DC
and besides, isn’t a “well person” only a patient whose diagnostic workup is not yet complete?
Absolutely nothing new. read the opening lines of Jerome K jerome’s classic ‘Three Men in a Boat’. It was published in 1879.