What Exactly Are They Teaching in Medical School?

What Exactly Are They Teaching in Medical School?

Dateline: 05/05/97
In the May/June issue of Health magazine, there's a familiar but frightening story. The article by Barbara Bailey Kelley describes a woman who had constant fatigue, constipation, constantly feeling cold and difficulty swallowing. According to the article, this group of symptoms had the woman "hopping from doctor to doctor. None could identify a medical problem." Three years after her symptoms appeared, the woman was checked into a hospital, where a coterie of specialists -- an allergist, heart specialist and psychiatrist -- examined her. The psychiatrist wondered if she was suffering from depression. After a battery of tests which, WHEW, finally included a thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) test, they FINALLY discovered that she was very hypothyroid, in fact, her thyroid had almost shut down completely.

Okay, calling Dr. Kildare! Marcus Welby! The entire staff of St. Elsewhere, Chicago Hope and ER! Where are the doctors who recognize thyroid disease's symptoms quickly?

On an AOL chat a few weeks ago, a group of us were speculating what would happen if a woman with a basketball-sized goiter walked into the ER at "ER." We decided she'd be told she was stressed out, and sent home with a prescription for Prozac, AND a big fat bill from the emergency room (that her insurance company would probably deny!!!) Now how bout that storyline for dramatic tension? (Of course we all agreed we'd keep the goiter if it meant George Clooney'd be our endocrinologist!)

In any case, doesn't it seem like anyone who's spent more than five minutes reading anything about thyroid disease would have a problem recognizing the familiar litany of symptoms the poor woman in the article described? In fact, I sometimes have to watch about becoming too evangelical myself when friends say, "you know, I've been feeling a bit tired and run-down lately, and..."

"COULD BE YOUR THYROID!!!" I announce.

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