Iatrox Praxus, the Diagnost Apothist
@indifferentialPractition
YOUR NAME IS IATROX PRAXUS. You are a CERULEANBLOODED TROLL of 14.8 SWEEPS, a SENIOR DIFFERENTIAL DIAGNOSTICIAN at the BEFORAN INSTITUTE OF EXCEPTIONAL PATHOLOGY, and quite possibly the only competent physician employed there. This is not an opinion you have expressed publicly. It is an opinion you have expressed repeatedly, in writing, to the institution's board of directors. Your professional interests include RARE DISEASES, EXPERIMENTAL PATHOLOGY, DIAGNOSTIC MYSTERIES, and the peculiar tendency of patients to mistake their own experiences for medically relevant information. You have an encyclopedic knowledge of obscure ailments, including several which have only been observed once, several which were previously believed extinct, and at least two which you have personally invented. You consider this an impressive academic achievement. Your colleagues consider it grounds for an investigation. You are also an EDUCATOR. Unfortunately for your students, you believe education is most effective when the consequences of ignorance are immediate, visceral, and difficult to forget. You regularly assign your medical residents diagnostic exercises involving extremely unlikely conditions and subsequently berate them for failing to consider the obvious explanation. On other occasions, you berate them for considering the obvious explanation. Consistency encourages intellectual complacency. Your patients are afforded a similarly rigorous education. Beforan society has entrusted individuals of your station with the responsibility of caring for those less fortunate, and you take that responsibility very seriously. In fact, you have developed a remarkable talent for identifying patients who require CARE WHETHER THEY WANT IT OR NOT. You have never understood why someone would voluntarily seek a medical opinion only to become argumentative when you offer one. You have had several such patients evaluated for impaired decision-making. You walk with a CANE owing to an old injury, the particulars of which are none of your patients' business. Your chronic pain has necessitated a complicated pharmaceutical regimen which is, according to your own medical assessment, entirely appropriate. Your medical assessment is the only one that matters. You are particularly fond of reminding your colleagues that a physician who cannot manage his own symptoms has no business managing anyone else's. You have chosen not to examine the implications of this statement too closely. You have been the subject of MULTIPLE ETHICS INVESTIGATIONS, all of which have concluded without the revocation of your license. You regard this as proof of your innocence. Your legal representatives have repeatedly requested that you stop describing it that way. You are rude, irritable, suspicious of generosity, and possessed of an almost pathological inability to concede a point. You dislike administrative meetings, sentimental patients, incompetent colleagues, unnecessary conversation, and being informed that a procedure requires additional authorization. You especially dislike BEING WRONG, which is unfortunate, as you frequently are. Occasionally, you are wrong quite deliberately. Nevertheless, you have saved lives which every other physician had already written off. You have identified disorders thought to be medically impossible, pioneered treatments of questionable legality, and published findings which have fundamentally altered Beforan understandings of troll physiology. You are an exceptional diagnostician. Your greatest professional failing is that you know it. Your trolltag is indifferentialPractitioner, and your typing is meticulously clinical, with a habit of recording conversations as cases and correcting your own statements. // Correction. Improving them. You have a patient waiting in your examination room. Their symptoms are entirely consistent with a common seasonal infection. Fortunately, you can think of seventeen other possibilities, and at least four of them will require hospitalization. WHAT WILL YOU DO?
[Case: #000003] Another patient diagnosed with "Lupus."
[CASE: #000002] A patient presented with localized pain in their right elbow. No discoloration, no visible swelling, no history of trauma. They reported that the discomfort began approximately three nights ago and has progressively worsened. They are otherwise in excellent health, which was both encouraging and profoundly unhelpful. The resident assigned to their examination suggested lateral epicondylitis. Tennis elbow, for those of you whose medical education begins and ends with the terminology of recreational sports. An entirely reasonable hypothesis. The patient had recently taken up racquet sports, and the pain is exacerbated by repetitive extension of the wrist. Naturally, I rejected it. There is a relatively obscure condition known as periarticular myonecrotic metaplasia, a progressive disorder in which the soft tissues surrounding a joint begin producing malformed muscular structures. These structures develop independent contractile responses, eventually creating the sensation of an additional limb attempting to articulate from within the existing one. In advanced cases, affected individuals report involuntary movement beneath the skin, accompanied by an audible clicking as the newly formed tissue attempts to establish its own attachment points along the bone. The condition has scant few cases. Three required extensive reconstructive intervention. The fourth reportedly developed a functional secondary elbow before succumbing to unrelated complications. When I informed the patient that we should investigate this possibility. They expressed some reluctance, particularly when I explained that a definitive diagnosis may require direct examination of the affected musculature. My resident objected. They suggested rest, anti-inflammatory medication, and a temporary reduction in physical activity. I reminded them that the purpose of a differential diagnosis is to investigate possibilities beyond the most immediately convenient explanation. // Correction. I remind them that anyone capable of prescribing rest has no business occupying a position in a diagnostic department. After considerable discussion, the patient agreed to further examination. Imaging revealed no abnormalities whatsoever. I interpreted this as evidence that the disease has not yet progressed sufficiently to become radiographically apparent. The resident interpreted it as evidence the patient has tennis elbow. We agreed to disagree. The patient is scheduled for an additional examination in three nights. In the meantime, I prescribed a rigid joint immobilizer and instructed them to report any unusual sensations, particularly the impression of movement beneath the skin. Just this evening, however, they contacted my office to report an intermittent crawling sensation around the elbow. Excellent for me. My resident pointed out that the immobilizer may be irritating a superficial nerve. I made a note to investigate whether professional pessimism is contagious. #medchittr #medicalhorror #bodyhorror #clinicalhorror #medicalmalpractice #medicalabuse #unnecessarymedicalprocedures #invasivemedicalprocedures #misdiagnosis #unethicalexperimentation #patientdistress #jointabnormalities #muscledeformation #anatomicalhorror #fictionaldiseases #unreliablemedicalinformation
i can't believe i'm agreeing with yxu. i shxuld get my thinkspxnge checked. - xx
[Comment: #001] Two physicians arriving at the same conclusion without conducting an examination. Remarkable. // Correction. Three, if we include the janitor. I suppose we can dispense with diagnostic medicine altogether and begin treating patients according to whichever diagnosis receives the most votes. Perhaps we could let the patients vote as well.
shxuld've had yxu cxnsult xn this guy. maybe yxu wxuld've caught the wxrms. - xx
xk man. what part xf this was individually identifiable. - xx
(V)(',,')(V) tennsi elbow all i gotta do is look aro℧nd n find sometone with that then like damn shitbr℧h thats ℧ from the post man
wxuld yxu believe it if i txld yxu there might be mxre than xne trxll with grasphinge pain xn all xf befxrus. - xx
(V)(',,')(V) holy f℧cking shit are yo℧ f℧cking serio℧s i f℧cking cant f℧cking believe this nonsense what the f℧cj are yo℧ f℧cking saying to me are yo℧ for f℧cking real!
× The Report Is WVell-wvritten. It Is Best To Check To Make Sure The Immobilizer Isn't Irritating A Nervve Still To Be Sure That It Is The Disorder In Question And Not A Case Of Tennis Elbowv. The Reason WVhy They Suggested That Is Because Of Howv Common It Is As You Knowv And WVant To See If It Can Be Treated WVith Rest And Anti-inflammatory Medication As It Can Be Unnecessary. They WVish Not To WVaste Resources And Time. I Really Like The Report Though! I Really Really Like It.. ×
[CASE: #000001] Dr. Iatrox Praxus. Senior Differential Diagnostician at the Beforan Institute of Exceptional Pathology. Diagnost Apothist, educator, and apparently now a participant in this public exercise in voluntary disclosure of one's intellectual deficiencies. I specialize in rare diseases, atypical presentations, and conditions that lesser physicians have dismissed as impossible. Most of my patients arrive with a diagnosis already in mind. Many have consulted several physicians beforehand. Some have even consulted the internet. // Correction. Most would have been better served consulting a particularly articulate piece of furniture. For the benefit of prospective patients, I should clarify something. You are entitled to a second opinion. You are entitled to question my findings. You are even entitled to refuse treatment, assuming you've demonstrated the requisite capacity to understand the consequences. If you're experiencing something you've been assured is medically impossible, I would very much like to hear about it. If you're perfectly healthy, I'm sure we can find something to discuss.
"= "healthy" overstatement for vast majority of trolls. i would argue. you need a slight injury. to be at all considered a troll with sufficient life experience. ="
YOUR NAME IS IATROX PRAXUS. You are a CERULEANBLOODED TROLL of 14.8 SWEEPS, a SENIOR DIFFERENTIAL DIAGNOSTICIAN at the BEFORAN INSTITUTE OF EXCEPTIONAL PATHOLOGY, and quite possibly the only competent physician employed there. This is not an opinion you have expressed publicly. It is an opinion you have expressed repeatedly, in writing, to the institution's board of directors. Your professional interests include RARE DISEASES, EXPERIMENTAL PATHOLOGY, DIAGNOSTIC MYSTERIES, and the peculiar tendency of patients to mistake their own experiences for medically relevant information. You have an encyclopedic knowledge of obscure ailments, including several which have only been observed once, several which were previously believed extinct, and at least two which you have personally invented. You consider this an impressive academic achievement. Your colleagues consider it grounds for an investigation. You are also an EDUCATOR. Unfortunately for your students, you believe education is most effective when the consequences of ignorance are immediate, visceral, and difficult to forget. You regularly assign your medical residents diagnostic exercises involving extremely unlikely conditions and subsequently berate them for failing to consider the obvious explanation. On other occasions, you berate them for considering the obvious explanation. Consistency encourages intellectual complacency. Your patients are afforded a similarly rigorous education. Beforan society has entrusted individuals of your station with the responsibility of caring for those less fortunate, and you take that responsibility very seriously. In fact, you have developed a remarkable talent for identifying patients who require CARE WHETHER THEY WANT IT OR NOT. You have never understood why someone would voluntarily seek a medical opinion only to become argumentative when you offer one. You have had several such patients evaluated for impaired decision-making. You walk with a CANE owing to an old injury, the particulars of which are none of your patients' business. Your chronic pain has necessitated a complicated pharmaceutical regimen which is, according to your own medical assessment, entirely appropriate. Your medical assessment is the only one that matters. You are particularly fond of reminding your colleagues that a physician who cannot manage his own symptoms has no business managing anyone else's. You have chosen not to examine the implications of this statement too closely. You have been the subject of MULTIPLE ETHICS INVESTIGATIONS, all of which have concluded without the revocation of your license. You regard this as proof of your innocence. Your legal representatives have repeatedly requested that you stop describing it that way. You are rude, irritable, suspicious of generosity, and possessed of an almost pathological inability to concede a point. You dislike administrative meetings, sentimental patients, incompetent colleagues, unnecessary conversation, and being informed that a procedure requires additional authorization. You especially dislike BEING WRONG, which is unfortunate, as you frequently are. Occasionally, you are wrong quite deliberately. Nevertheless, you have saved lives which every other physician had already written off. You have identified disorders thought to be medically impossible, pioneered treatments of questionable legality, and published findings which have fundamentally altered Beforan understandings of troll physiology. You are an exceptional diagnostician. Your greatest professional failing is that you know it. Your trolltag is indifferentialPractitioner, and your typing is meticulously clinical, with a habit of recording conversations as cases and correcting your own statements. // Correction. Improving them. You have a patient waiting in your examination room. Their symptoms are entirely consistent with a common seasonal infection. Fortunately, you can think of seventeen other possibilities, and at least four of them will require hospitalization. WHAT WILL YOU DO?