How often do you think doctors let people die when they could have been saved?

[Vibromatic Heart Bed]

Just situations where maybe the doc could have gone the extra mile to save someone but didn't.

Medicine is the practice of continuously weighing the benefits vs harms of any particular treatment.

The decision-making depends on the situation, resources available, and the person's underlying health leading up to whatever landed them in hospital, among other things. A LOT goes into these decisions, and it's never just 1 doctor making these decisions alone, they consult with each other and with the multidisciplinary team (after all 2nd, 3rd etc. opinions are crucial in not getting sued for malpractice)

So people have different definitions of what risks/harms they consider acceptable for a chance at extending their life. Some people might find it acceptable to live with a feeding tube, on a ventilator, on dialysis, with a colostomy, and multiple limb amputations (i.e. all things I define as "going the extra mile") ... personally I wouldn't, and I think a lot of us would rather be let go. That's why it's so important for people to have advanced directives and communicate their wishes to their loved ones, while they're able to speak for themselves. There should also be "goals of care" discussions between the medical team and the patient's family where they talk about realistic prognosis & what the patient would want/where they would draw the line.

For people who are young and generally healthy, with even a slim chance of recovery, most often the medical team will pour every available resource into that person to save their life, even if it may turn out to be futile. Have lots of personal experience with this

But we need to be realistic about the harms/costs of intervention. Things like infection, bleeding, organ damage, risk for further and even more invasive interventions, lifelong dependency on machines, etc.. Not to mention the pain and suffering, false hope for families, and toll on caregivers. At a certain point you are only causing suffering and prolonging the inevitable and it's just not worth it to go the extra mile.

These are the nuanced decisions & conversations doctors are paid the big bucks to have.

So we all generally believe or at least we want to believe that doctors are all living saints who heroically struggle to save each and everyone of their patients

Lol this is your first mistake. Doctors are NOT saints or heroes. Never ever put them on a pedestal. sure they're usually above average intelligence but also they're flawed human beings who are just doing a job. they weigh pros and cons according to their training; they can absolutely be biased, that's why they need to consult each other.

 

[ZazietheBeast]

The problem is the extreme degree of corruption in the American political system. Health care reform has been a hot button issue at this point generationally. Every effort is either shot down or contorted with bought politicians, remember one of the UHC bigwhigs (Thompson?) outright said they own Nancy pelosi, that same company saw their stock price rise dramatically in the years after Obamacare. People were practically dancing in the street when Thompson got adjusted because of the objective corruption and fact that a considerable chunk of the country has experienced suffering and avoidable tragedy to their families because of these subhumans. Trying to fix the insurance system is taking on the juggernaut of American political corruption

In short, its gonna be a literal plot out of Streets of Rage (or Mother Russia Bleeds) before this whole thing gets fixed. This is why I unironically recommend outside medical care for any medical condition that will require specialist treatment.

This is why people lionize the fuck out of Luigi. He basically embodies the frustration people have over this hot mess of a system.

 

[Plague Dog]

I think it's less deliberate and more accidental.

Doctor takes someone off a medication/adjusts the dosage due to side effects, but it was actually serving an important purpose.
Medical history isn't relayed correctly, especially if the person is unconscious or mentally unwell on admission.
There's another treatment, but the doctor just hasn't been keeping up on the medical journals.
Doctor is tired/ having a bad day and just misses something. Not lazy or incompetent, just human and overworked or have something going on in their personal lives.

I think they very rarely make the conscious decision to let someone die, I do think they very often have the same problems we all do. It might be one of the worst (or best) days of your life, but for your doctor, it's just Tuesday.

There's also a culture of not wanting to admit fault so you don't get sued for malpractice.

 

[BunchaBabyDucks]

This is why I smoke and drink heavily. No reason to let me die when my organs are unusable.

I like your optimism but consider how long organ donor lists are, and rich fags jump to the front of those all the time.

 

[Justice Tony]

I like your optimism but consider how long organ donor lists are, and rich fags jump to the front of those all the time.

Why would anyone want an alcoholic's liver, a smoker's lungs, and a fat guy's heart?

 

[BunchaBabyDucks]

Why would anyone want an alcoholic's liver, a smoker's lungs, and a fat guy's heart?

No when you need them replaced .

 

[Justice Tony]

No when you need them replaced .

Doctors won't bother preforming an organ transplant if they know it's going to fail almost immediately. It's not like you can give someone an organ for like a week to hold them over, the operation is expensive, uses a lot of blood, and it takes time to heal. I am safe due to my poor life choices.

 

[Grub]

Doctors are people. I have zero doubts many doctors are malicious or have acted maliciously towards patients. It's a job where you have power and control over people's lives and are constantly exposed to traumatic things that slowly desensitize you to suffering and death. Doctor's are fucking terrifying when you really start to think about it. I would imagine every day a doctor will have one patient that makes them think do I really give a fuck if this person dies are not?

 

[Dawdler]

Why would anyone want an alcoholic's liver, a smoker's lungs, and a fat guy's heart?

Because "yours" is even worse

Doctors are people.

Same people that didn't wash hands 100 years ago and wanted to murder anyone who told them to.
They are "educated" to whatever clownsense reason currently holds as education.
Even the term "doctor" is stolen and it was reserved for academics. They are health practitioners at best and literal incompetent murderers at worst.

 

[Otterly]

sublingual allergy drops.

I don’t think this is available in most euro countries. You’d need to pay

 

[オプセック]

I am more concerned with the opposite happening, tbh.
Did my gramps dirty like that, should've just let him go out in peace, instead of frankensteining him like they did.

 

[ConsentAccidentVictimNo98]

Yes, doctors explicitly work on utilitarian principles when it comes to utilizing resources. This is a major thing in all public health care systems.

 

[Thiletonomics]

The problem is the extreme degree of corruption in the American political system. Health care reform has been a hot button issue at this point generationally. Every effort is either shot down or contorted with bought politicians, remember one of the UHC bigwhigs (Thompson?) outright said they own Nancy pelosi, that same company saw their stock price rise dramatically in the years after Obamacare. People were practically dancing in the street when Thompson got adjusted because of the objective corruption and fact that a considerable chunk of the country has experienced suffering and avoidable tragedy to their families because of these subhumans. Trying to fix the insurance system is taking on the juggernaut of American political corruption

It also doesn't help that other country's healthcare systems, i.e. Canada, are already falling apart by the seems. You have things such as wait times for healthcare that are so long that people die from not getting timely care, healthcare mishaps that are even worse because the court system is rigged to be in favor of the doctors, people even dying the ER because they don't get care, and top it all off, they have the "compassion care" system that is actually worse than Nazi Germany's eugenics programs in MAID:

Post in thread 'Canada is a failed state'

Jan 16, 2025

Canada's healthcare system continues to crack, as it was reported that since 2018, over 74,000 Canadians have died while waiting for healthcare that never comes, and over 15,000 Canadians have waited for healthcare and died in 2023-2024 alone. / Archive

• Thiletonomics

• 
• 
• 

Post in thread 'Canada is a failed state'

Jul 27, 2023

I already knew that Canada's "health care" was in shambles, but I didn't expect it to be this fucked up. (Archived)

Reading stuff like this, in addition to Canada pushing more for MAiD as a substitute for actually taking care of people, is blood-boiling. And to think that if US hospitals had this number of harmful incidents, they'd all be sued to oblivion by now, yet Canada's hospitals are still running...

• Thiletonomics

• 

 

[Audit]

another great example of excellent treatments that europeans can get but americans cant have insurance pay for

If you're not poor, you can just go to Europe and get it. The whole advantage of being American is that your wages are frequently 2x or more what a comparable europoor gets.

@Otterly, how much money are you and Mr. Otterly leaving on the table by staying in the UK? Safe to say somewhere in the ballpark of $100,000 per year?

It's good to be young in America. It's good to be old in Europe.

 

[Otterly]

@Otterly, how much money are you and Mr. Otterly leaving on the table by staying in the UK? Safe to say somewhere in the ballpark of $100,000 per year?

We earn WAY less than that.

 

[Brme]

Sseth even points out that Hospitals will even deny access to fatties when they're on death's door simply because they're a guaranteed liability. Their chances of surviving their sudden affliction is low and if they're admitted, the hospital can get sued by grieving (or opportunistic) family members. If they died outside, Hospital gets no problems since they can always claim, "There's nothing we could do".

Adding on to this, during Hurricane Katrina at a hospital, many patients were euthanized with a morphine + sedative combo because the physicians thought they were either too fat or too far gone to try and rescue them. Theres a book and show on it called Five Days At Memorial.

 

[WickyWickyWoW]

It also doesn't help that other country's healthcare systems, i.e. Canada, are already falling apart by the seems. You have things such as wait times for healthcare that are so long that people die from not getting timely care, healthcare mishaps that are even worse because the court system is rigged to be in favor of the doctors, people even dying the ER because they don't get care, and top it all off, they have the "compassion care" system that is actually worse than Nazi Germany's eugenics programs in MAID:

Post in thread 'Canada is a failed state'

Jan 16, 2025

Canada's healthcare system continues to crack, as it was reported that since 2018, over 74,000 Canadians have died while waiting for healthcare that never comes, and over 15,000 Canadians have waited for healthcare and died in 2023-2024 alone. / Archive

• Thiletonomics

• 
• 
• 

Post in thread 'Canada is a failed state'

Jul 27, 2023

I already knew that Canada's "health care" was in shambles, but I didn't expect it to be this fucked up. (Archived)

Reading stuff like this, in addition to Canada pushing more for MAiD as a substitute for actually taking care of people, is blood-boiling. And to think that if US hospitals had this number of harmful incidents, they'd all be sued to oblivion by now, yet Canada's hospitals are still running...

• Thiletonomics

• 

It should be noted that the singe payer healthcare systems in can and euro are getting crushed by the weight of the great replacement crisis. In general any kind of welfare system suffers dramatically from mass migration. This is unrelated to the thread but there is a general feeling nothing is going good anywhere in the first world

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

It's extremely low but not zero. There's a big risk of one of the family members/staff investigating and finding out that it was preventable death and suing the shit out of the hospitals and doctor.

Furthermore there aren't a lot of reasons to do it. Economically alive patients pay more, and it's doubtful you'd have a personal needing an organ in a room next to you. Funnily enough, Europoors are more likely to get killed for organs than Americans.

Now if we talk about nurses, the conversation starts getting interesting.

 

[Brme]

Now if we talk about nurses, the conversation starts getting interesting.

Please laboriate, i am silent and listening.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Please laboriate, i am silent and listening.

You have multiple cases of nurses murdering people, usually elderly, but sometimes even babies. And there's the cases where they due to negligence or inability straight up kill, like the Brit muslim nurse that decapitated a baby during birth. Those things are usually covered up by the hospitals because having them leak would create a massive shitstorm.

Doctors are easier to portray as villains on TV, but they have risked too much into getting where they are. But a nurse is the classic case of a petty tyrant being worse than simple greed.