#overmedicalisation — Public Fediverse posts

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I've just finished "The Age of Diagnosis" by Suzanne O'Sullivan.

The author, an Irish neurologist, claims that we are becoming the victims of overdiagnosis and overmedicalization.

Overdiagnosis - a term with which I was not not hitherto familiar - "refers to a diagnosis that is correct but which does not benefit the patient and may arguably do harm. Overdiagnosis occurs when a medical problem is detected at a stage when medical treatment is not really required".

Overmedicalisation "occurs when ordinary human differences, behaviour and life stages are given medical labels..."

I found this book thought provoking, in particular with regard to the author's challenge to commonly held assumptions about the benefits of screening and pre-emptive testing. I also thought her warnings about the dangers of thinking of diagnosis as a technical procedure rather than a physician's attempt to explain symptoms should be heeded.

Links to a couple of reviews can be found here: https://floss.social/@rdnielsen/114478603556078827

Some will disagree in the strongest of terms with her arguments about diagnosis creep with regard to autism, ADHD, and Lyme disease. This critical review accuses O'Sullivan of a poorly informed paternalism: https://mastodon.ie/@Tupp_ed/114609317582047709

Although I am not going to discuss those specific issues, I do worry that....

#TheAgeOfDiagnosis #SuzanneOSullivan #Health #Medicine
#Overdiagnosis #Overmedicalization #Overmedicalisation #Medicalization

🌀 Is medicine a healing or a dealing profession?—When profit drives treatment, care becomes a collateral |
@ProfTimJackson | 📚 #TheCareEconomy

🔗 https://www.youtube.com/shorts/MbDWEZUpQ3E

For details about the book, please see → https://timjackson.org.uk/the-care-economy/
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#CareEconomy #PostGrowth #WellbeingEconomy #ProsperityWithoutGrowth #Degrowth #BeyondGrowth #PostWachstum #ÖkonomieDerFürsorge #WohlstandOhneWachstum #HealthEconomics #OverMedicalisation #Financialisation #Naturopathy #healingpowerofnature #PhilosophyOfCare