What we need is the francise model they are starting to explore in India. Repeatable processes encoded in easy to follow three-ring binders; checklists and procedures that anyone can follow. This will take care of the basics and free up resources for the gourmet care we all need from time to time.
I find it a bit alarming and surprising that there aren't documented, repeatable processes for how to treat common diagnoses and disorders wholistically. Although my surprise is tempered when I think of the arrogance of almost every doctor I've come into contact with - and that's quite a few: an uncommonly persistent neurologist found my pituitary tumour when I was 12 after several others decided I was probably just making up my headaches because I didn't want to exercise.
I've dealt with many other specialist and GPs since then and there's always that omniscient, arrogant attitude from them, especially when they don't have an easy answer for you. I've also watched a few people go through medical school and seen them gradually become like this as well.
It's a world apart, but IT and software development practices have matured over the last 10+ years and have been forced (sometimes catalysed by business requirements e.g. Sarbanes Oxley) to adopt standards, practices and more thorough documentation than previously.
Personally for me it's a narcissistic thrill thinking that you can invent something brand new or solve some problem that someone else couldn't. For me then, the standardisation, extra documentation and the increasing amount of lego-brick style clicking together of existing pieces of wizardry that someone else has built have made IT less exciting.
Of course I could go build an incredible open source something or other in my own time but narcissism is about _delusions_ of grandeur, not actual grandeur ;)
So the bush I'm beating around is that maybe personal and collective arrogance of medical practitioners has blocked this kind of thing being implemented before?
Eastern cultures are much less individualistic - they seem to rely much less on individuals to creatively and independently figure things out in so many fields and situations, preferring to defer to tradition, or predefined rules, or an authority.
I'm not saying doctors are irresponsibly arrogant, they do amazing work, most are thoughtful, compassionate and insanely dedicated people who commit their entire lives to what they do.
But is the mindset that the rarefied world of medicine and its practitioners being so important and sophisticated that every situation requires years of education and experience to manage holding it back?
I remember reading an article (or mayba was it in a book?) about that; a parallel was made with the checklists in airplanes, after the crash of the B17 prototype in the '30s. If only I could find a link...
Comments
What we need is the francise model they are starting to explore in India. Repeatable processes encoded in easy to follow three-ring binders; checklists and procedures that anyone can follow. This will take care of the basics and free up resources for the gourmet care we all need from time to time.
I find it a bit alarming and surprising that there aren't documented, repeatable processes for how to treat common diagnoses and disorders wholistically. Although my surprise is tempered when I think of the arrogance of almost every doctor I've come into contact with - and that's quite a few: an uncommonly persistent neurologist found my pituitary tumour when I was 12 after several others decided I was probably just making up my headaches because I didn't want to exercise.
I've dealt with many other specialist and GPs since then and there's always that omniscient, arrogant attitude from them, especially when they don't have an easy answer for you. I've also watched a few people go through medical school and seen them gradually become like this as well.
It's a world apart, but IT and software development practices have matured over the last 10+ years and have been forced (sometimes catalysed by business requirements e.g. Sarbanes Oxley) to adopt standards, practices and more thorough documentation than previously.
Personally for me it's a narcissistic thrill thinking that you can invent something brand new or solve some problem that someone else couldn't. For me then, the standardisation, extra documentation and the increasing amount of lego-brick style clicking together of existing pieces of wizardry that someone else has built have made IT less exciting.
Of course I could go build an incredible open source something or other in my own time but narcissism is about _delusions_ of grandeur, not actual grandeur ;)
So the bush I'm beating around is that maybe personal and collective arrogance of medical practitioners has blocked this kind of thing being implemented before?
Eastern cultures are much less individualistic - they seem to rely much less on individuals to creatively and independently figure things out in so many fields and situations, preferring to defer to tradition, or predefined rules, or an authority.
I'm not saying doctors are irresponsibly arrogant, they do amazing work, most are thoughtful, compassionate and insanely dedicated people who commit their entire lives to what they do.
But is the mindset that the rarefied world of medicine and its practitioners being so important and sophisticated that every situation requires years of education and experience to manage holding it back?
I remember reading an article (or mayba was it in a book?) about that; a parallel was made with the checklists in airplanes, after the crash of the B17 prototype in the '30s. If only I could find a link...
Google - gawande checklist and you will get this article http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/12/10/071210fa_fact_... and a whole page of links to Amazon and reviews of his new book The Checklist Manifesto .
Right on! It's from 2007, unsurprisingly I didn't remembered all of the details :) Really great article.