Early in my training, I learned to get patients to quickly sign consent forms without reading them. I didn’t have time to read them either. I didn’t know enough to explain risks or answer questions. Like my peers, I reassured patients that what we were giving them was safe. We just needed a signature to inject IV contrast or give medication. I gave Spanish-speaking moms multiple consent forms in English. They signed on behalf of their children. They trusted me.
I was trained to be deceptive.
In my final year of training, I was told to prescribe Premarin (Pregnant-Mares’-Urine-derived estrogen) to all menopausal women—without explaining alternatives or risks. I refused. I was reprimanded. I went to the medical library. I did my own research rather than rely on the drug company or my training program (that received money for their involvement in the Women’s Health Initiative study on Premarin in menopausal women).
Beyond the cruelty to pregnant mares, I discovered risks to my patients (for which the Premarin study was eventually halted). Since I had no time in clinic to share drug risks and alternatives, I held free public library lectures for my patients and community where I reviewed all menopause hormone therapies (including non-drug options) and shared simple, yet comprehensive handouts.
Here’s the training I wish I’d received on informed consent.
What is informed consent?
Informed consent is a medicolegal conversation between a patient and trusted health professional who recommends a procedure, reviews its alternatives, risks and benefits, then answers questions.
Who is legally capable of giving consent?
Patients must be at least 18 years old and competent to voluntarily—under no duress—consent or refuse proposed medical interventions.
Can children give informed consent?
Children under 17 cannot generally provide informed consent. Parents must be consulted for all treatments or interventions on minors.
What does “PARQ conference held” mean in the medical record?
The PARQ acronym is Procedure, Alternatives, Risks/Benefits, Questions— minimum requirements for informed consent. “PARQ done” means a meeting was held to establish consent for a procedure in which alternatives, risks (including potential risks) and benefits were discussed and patient had all their questions answered.
What alternatives must be discussed?
Viable alternative procedures and treatments must be disclosed, including the option of no treatment and potential risks of non-treatment.
What risks and benefits must be reviewed?
Risks and benefits of proposed intervention and all alternative interventions must be reviewed—including serious and life-threatening injuries such as organ damage, disfigurement, sexual dysfunction, irreversible impairment, and death. An exhaustive list of minor remote risks need not be shared.
How long can patients ask questions?
Patients can ask as many questions as needed to make a decision. Patients can be sent home with educational materials and return at a later date to ask follow-up questions as needed and should never be pressured into an elective procedure urgently.
What if a patient is unable to give informed consent?
If unable to make independent decisions, patients may need a psychiatric competency evaluation and a surrogate decision-maker or court-appointed guardian.
When is informed consent not required?
If incapacitated with a life-threatening emergency, “implied consent” is assumed unless a do not resuscitate order is present. A signed consent is not required for simple procedures such as checking blood pressure. In rare cases, court-ordered treatments for incarcerated persons may be mandated by law.
Who can obtain informed consent?
The duty is generally the responsibility of the patient’s physician. Qualified health professionals with adequate knowledge of PARQ elements of proposed intervention can obtain consent. A qualified professional must not delegate informed consent to an unqualified professional such as a new physician, medical trainee, or ancillary staff unable to educate patient. Note: consent given to one health professional is not transferrable to another—unless patient agrees to a substitute to perform intervention.
Must informed consent be documented in medical record? Is a signed form required?
For surgeries and invasive procedures, a consent form is signed by patient and health professional and placed in the medical record. For less invasive tests and drugs with known safety profiles, consent is summarized in chart note with no signed form.
Does a patient signature on a consent form guarantee informed consent?
No. A signature does not prove effective communication. In fact, patients have been pressured to sign consent forms in non-native languages with poor health literacy while naked on a gurney just minutes before procedure is performed.
How can the informed consent process be improved?
At minimum, thirty minutes should be allotted at least one week prior to intervention (depending on procedure complexity) for consent conversations delivered at a fourth-grade level with visual tools (videos or image-rich pamphlets) and interpreter if patient is a non-native speaker.
How can consent forms be improved?
Non-industry experts with no conflict of interest should create unbiased informed consent materials. If intervention is experimental with risk of serious injury or death, multi-page informed consent forms should be provided for patient review ahead of experimental procedure with a signed copy given to patient upon consent.
Why is informed consent important?
Informed consent is a fundamental human right of patient—and health professional—that honors the principle of body autonomy and prevents human experimentation.
Have patients been subjected to experiments without consent?
Yes. Due to human experiments by Nazi physicians and the 1932 “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male” that continued nearly forty years, the Institutional Review Board now regulates human research. Informed consent for research requires full disclosure of information, competency evaluation, and voluntary participation. Research subjects must understand they are enrolling in an experiment and human safety and effectiveness of treatment is unknown. Yet even in modern times patients may be unaware they are taking new experimental medications with unknown safety and unclear long-term risks.
What is shared decision making?
A collaborative communication process between health professionals and patients in which best scientific evidence is shared and patients’ decisions are supported with all parties actively involved in medical decision-making.
What is informed refusal?
A medicolegal informed refusal conversation requires a health professional to disclose possible risks of refusing care and then document patient refusal of test or procedure in chart—without antagonizing the relationship.
Can health professionals’ subjective views impact informed consent?
Yes. Employer-driven productivity requirements and protocols, insurance drug formularies, medical board sanctions, financial kickbacks, education and specialty training, knowledge base, religious views, and cultural norms can all impact flow of information from health professionals to patients. Consent conversations may vary significantly depending on who is obtaining consent.
What are examples of lack of informed consent?
Staff misrepresentation: Nonphysicians failing to identify credentials and introducing self as doctor; failure to inform patient of midlevel anesthesia (CRNA & AA); failure to accept refusal of nonphysician care by NP, PA; surgical/anesthesia consent obtained by unqualified office staff. Trainee refusal: Threatening to cancel surgery if patient refuses trainee participation; failure to inform patient of medical trainees in surgery; failure to inform patient of student genital exams under anesthesia; failure to ask and/or document patient refusal of trainees’ care. Time issues: Attempting to obtain consent in a 10-minute visit for an experimental drug; multipage micro-font forms given to naked patient (without reading glasses) on gurney en route to procedure. Form issues: Patients told to accept entire document without changes or strike through; consent forms signed by patients with developmental delay, acute mental health issues, or dementia. Coercion/threats: Offering gift cards or financial awards for medical intervention; enticing children with ice cream or prizes to submit to medical intervention (without parental consent); threatening job loss for refusing medical procedure/intervention.
What happens if a patient lacks informed consent and suffers serious injury?
Physicians may be held liable in a malpractice case. Without proper documentation, there’s no proof of patient consent. Violence toward health professionals, including physician homicide may be carried out by a patient such as recent case of a man with post-op pain killing his orthopedic surgeon.
Are physicians trained in educational settings that honor informed consent?
Trainees are often left without supervision in production-driven clinics/hospitals with inadequate knowledge to obtain informed consent. Trainees are not protected by labor laws and may work > 24-hour shifts, unable to care for their own physiologic needs. Sleep deprivation is more dangerous than working under the influence of alcohol. In fact, being awake for at least 24 hours is like having a blood alcohol content of 0.10% (higher than legal limit) and would interfere with one’s ability to obtain informed consent—or perform any medical procedure safely. Trainees lack informed consent of mental/physical health risks of a medical education—including DNA aging six times faster than their non-medical peers and are uninformed of high-risk specialties for suicide (anesthesia, surgery). Groomed in training environments that negate their own human rights to informed consent, physicians are at high occupational risk of performing subpar informed consent on patients.
Any tips for health professionals on improving informed consent?
Converse at eye level with patient fully dressed to decrease power differential. Provide step-by-step description of procedure (videos are helpful). Research beyond industry-supported data when providing information to patients. Avoid consent forms with medicolegal jargon or include list of medical definitions written at a fourth-grade level. Use teach-back questions to ensure patient understands and feels empowered to consent or refuse.
How can patients get more information before consenting to medications or procedures?
Before taking a new medicine, read drug insert online or through pharmacies. Join discussion groups for specific drugs, procedures, and illnesses. Do your research. Medical sites may overemphasize benefits and minimize risks, while injured patients will focus on life-altering adverse effects. For example, radiologists might minimize IV contrast risks, while a subset of patients who lacked informed consent for MRI gadolinium contrast are in a Facebook support group suffering debilitating effects of gadolinium deposition disease. To learn more about psychiatric drugs, patients may join a Facebook Benzodiazepine Withdrawal Support Group and even Psychedelic Assisted Therapy to learn about Ketamine, if recommended by their physician.
Can patients initiate informed consent discussions with doctors?
Certainly. Be proactive with your physician about PARQ—procedures, alternatives, risks/benefits, and questions—before all medical interventions, tests, and medications. Always request cheaper generic drugs with known safety profiles. Avoid experimental procedures and new drugs unless benefit-risk ratio is in your favor. When in doubt, ask more questions or get a second opinion. Informed consent is your responsibility (Addendum: actually your right to receive and you should demand to have the information you need). Never agree to anything unless you feel comfortable. You should never be coerced or threatened to accept a medical intervention.
I wish to thank all the patients and health professionals who shared their experiences with informed consent for this article.
Pamela Wible, M.D., is founder of IdealMedicalCare.org where she teaches doctors how to heal from the trauma of training so they can practice ideal medical care with joy. Contact Dr. Wible.
THANK YOU SO MUCH, Dr. Wible! It is incredibly validating to see a physician recommended online support groups because most medical staff mock and gaslight anyone who uses “Dr. Google”.
There is tremendous knowledge and help in the groups. I worked in pharma for many years and learned more about the drugs I promoted through online peer groups than from the pharma company I worked for. That limited and highly censored information is what reaches physicians and prescribers. The whole system is so broken.
Thank you again for all that you do.
My apologies for tagging you so often! I understand that you can’t respond, but want people to have an easy way to find you.
Oh thank YOU Barbara, I put so much time and energy into thinking of how to stop the animosity and tension between doctors and patients and to improve the conversation and I do think it all comes down to TIME. We are trained in such an assembly-line medicine style of practice (remind me to tell you about all the TOYOTA manufacturing books I found in the medical library sometime bc they actually DO model healthcare after the automotive industry!!)
WOW! You worked in Pharma & learned more about the drugs you were promoting from online groups. Whoa! That says a lot!! The censorship is appalling and of course we should suspect that we are not getting the FULL story as docs from people who make a living peddling their potions to us.
TAG me as often as you like.
The benefit of social media is that we can have the kind of connection & conversations that I could never have in the early 1990s during my training. Helps with the transparent flow of information and the lived stories of those who have been involved with various drugs, illnesses, and procedures.
THANK YOU & PLEASE SHARE WIDELY. 🙏
I read it. Thank you very much Pamela. I just posted it. One thing though about specifically vaccine injuries – it’s well known that doctors pretty much are never held liable for injuries, even if they bullied parents into doing it. Pharmaceutical companies are also not held liable. It all falls on the parents, which is why IC is so important with vaccines. Just for your own knowledge, I know what happens when parents finally win a case after filing with the NVIC fund… they are further threatened that if they go public with it they will be cut off from receiving any further compensation. So parents will pull down their FB pages, fundraisers, any and all trace of their son or daughter suffering from a life-threatening vaccine injury, just so they can get the help they need financially to survive afterwards. It’s terrible what happens to the parents just to get help. Reading through the thousands of payouts, every one of them says at the bottom, “I agree that by accepting this compensation it is in no way proving that a vaccine caused this injury” or something close to that. That’s what our government does. Also, almost every doctor I know has never read an entire vaccine insert. For any vaccine. Let alone all of them. They have no idea that a vaccine insert can be anywhere from 15-65 pages long and that there are 2-3 pages of side effects listed on almost every one of them. They are only trained on the CDC schedule and why it is the best thing for ALL children. And if you ask a doctor if they know how individual methylation would impact a child’s ability to process vaccines, they look like a doe in the headlights. Maybe you know, but most don’t. Which is stunning.
This is SO upsetting!! I have no words.
I agree, this is so tragic. My family members have been devastatingly harmed by the covid vaccines and we’ve gotten nothing but ridicule and gaslighting from the medical community and general public. People are NOT being properly informed about the risks.
Such a travesty—while patients suffer Pharma has secured their own immunity for any liability which is SO despicable. I have witnessed such a lack of empathy for anyone who has an adverse reaction (to almost any drug) that falls out of the narrative of the “expected.” Since (as you can read below in prior comments) even the pharma rep was unable to educate doctors due to the widespread censorship on all drugs (exaggerate the benefits & minimize the risks). I’m heartbroken by the lack of empathy toward those suffering adverse reactions and debilitating illness after receiving meds. Sending you my support and validation for the experience that I have witnessed with my own eyes. Physicians who have had adverse reactions are even disbelieved by their peers. I think you may find a level of understanding about what is behind the betrayal you and your family have experienced in this free ebook (20-min read): Physician Betrayal: How Our Heroes become Villains.
This is so disturbing! Big pharma tells so many lies to patients. I am the daughter of a doctor and I was poisoned (without my consent) with benzodiazepines at age 9, and then SSRI’s at age 16. I was not only lied to about the risks of the medications, but I was also a child and too young to even consent to the longterm damage it caused my brain and body.💔The entire system is evil beyond words.
So sickening Shelly! I am really so disturbed by what has happening in medicine!
I worked as a critical care RN for 37 years. In all that time, I have only observed actual physicians obtaining that consent a scant handful of times. The nursing staff is always tasked with obtaining the signed “informed” consent. I always asked my patients if the physician had explained the procedure, explained risks/benefits, and if they had any questions for the doc. Most of the time when they would leave an order “obtain consent for xyz procedure” they had maybe mentioned the procedure to the patient but certainly not had a proper informed consent discussion with the patient. I used to also place PICC lines and I would consent the patient myself since I strongly believe that the person performing the procedure should be the one obtaining the consent. Tasking ” obtain consent” from the nursing staff is just wrong, IMO. We would be glad to bring over a consent form for the doc, but in my unicorn and fairy dust perfect world the person getting the signature should be the one explaining what can possibly go wrong!
shocked and then not surprising. The devolution of the care of patients is just so upsetting
My problem with your post is that you are downplaying the degree to which physicians often lie about the risks of procedures and medications. It is so much more common than anyone in the medical establishment will dare admit.
When I was 16, I was told that antidepressants are non-addictive (lies), that they don’t harm the developing brain (lies), and that they have no long lasting side effects (lies – they cause PSSD). The “informed consent” sheet didn’t outline any of these risks and neither did the manufacturer drug insert, either. I was only a child and I wasn’t told about any of the serious dangers.
This started a nightmare which lasted many years – and permanent damage to my brain and sexual function, which I was only not warned about, but was overtly lied to.
So you say informed consent is a patient’s responsibility – I asked my doctor questions, I did all the research I knew how to do. But I was lied to. How is it my responsibility that I was lied to about the risks? How is that my fault, and not the physician’s?
I think you need to do a better job discussing the lies that us patients are told by our doctors. It wasn’t just me, but MOST people who have been given antidepressants have been lied to about the risks. We shouldn’t be blamed for trusting them; we asked the questions, we consented to what we were told the risks were (which were lies). Our doctors should be held accountable. This entire system is disgraceful and disgusting.
I wanted to add to this: I don’t mean to be overly critical of your article, but I found the ending 59 be kind of disrespectful to patients, with an element of victim-blaming.
You say it’s the patient’s responsibility to get informed consent – as if it’s somehow our FAULT if we haven’t gotten informed consent. As if we are somehow irresponsible or to blame if we don’t get informed consent.
I’m not sure how you would view the scenario where a child or teenage kid is lied to by their doctor about the risks of a medication or procedure. I thought I was being responsible by reading the drug information and asking my doctor questions, but I was told that the drugs were not addictive and that they didn’t cause any long lasting damage to the brain or body. As a literal child, I thought I was being responsible by taking the time to read about it and ask questions, but I had absolutely NO clue that my doctor was lying to me about the risks. Would you consider me to be irresponsible for being lied to? Would you blame me, the underage patient, for not obtaining informed consent? If so, that doesn’t seem fair at all. Thanks for reading my comment.
I think part of the shared decison making concept patients should feel EMPOWERED to demand answers to their questions & informed consent. I do not feel patients are often aware of their rights (thus the article – though no intention to blame victims). Not patients fault if informed consent is not given since most do not even know they have the right to demand consent & as mentioned previously they may not even get it if they ask or demand (due to the tiers of deceit within health care including Pharma & doctors complicit betrayal of their oath). If you are interested you might check out the free ebook I wrote on why doctors betray patients (it is a very quick read – like 20 minutes): PHYSICIAN BETRAYAL: HOW OUR HEROES BECOME VILLAINS (free download at that link).
So not just deception & omission, but lying about the safety? In the intro I shared my deception by omission and reassurance about safety because that is what I was expected to do or I’d get written up as slow, inefficient (as many do). I absolutely agree that people are misinformed about psych meds and addictive treatments. All make sense given the fact that Pharma lies to doctors and sometime we do not even know the REAL impact and adverse reactions of drugs we prescribe (as the Pharma rep indicated in her comment). Informed consent should be demanded by the patient if physician or health professional is not forthcoming. It is actually the duty of the physician per the article (mentioned that in the liability section I believe). I am disgusted as you are with the level of deceit and actually wrote an entire piece on the lies perpetrated by physicians (and we truly DID enter this profession to help people) See: Why doctors lie.
Shelly, I am really truly sorry for the lack of accountability and the omissions and lies that you have encountered related to psych meds. My mom’s a psychiatrist and boy do I have stories (too many for a comment here).
Thank you for your comment. I will read your article on it now an I full-heartedly agree that doctors are lied to about the risks of drugs. But that shouldn’t make it excusable, I think it’s a responsibility of a physician to dig into the research and know the truth about whatever they are prescribing. And to listen to patients who have been harmed, instead of dismissing and gaslighting them, as I was. I was given psychiatric drugs because BOTH my parents were diagnosed with cancer in the same year, I had a traumatic medical surgery (another story involving zero informed consent – I went under anesthesia for a simple 10-minute hymenectomy procedure and left the office with an HOUR long invasive vaginal septum removal surgery which I NEVER CONSENTED TO!!😭 All this as a child!). Not just that but I had to switch schools because I was in a wheelchair due to a foot surgery which my surgeon also lied to me about. I was already extremely traumatized, scared, vulnerable, and nervous… so I was very careful when I went to see a psychiatrist about my understandably declining mental health due to my awful circumstances. I was so careful and demanded informed consent. I had a long list of questions I asked very clearly and pointedly to my psychiatrist, and I even got a second opinion. I thought I was given it, I didn’t know I was being lied to about the risks from both psychiatrists – I later discovered this is because the entire psychiatric establishment is based on lies.💔
TOTALLY AGREE Shelly ❤️🩹 Not excusing anyone. I went out of my way to create true informed consent for hormones (which can be SUPER dangerous!) as I shared at the beginning of article and gave free lectures at the public library. I am SO UPSET about what you went through (including parents with cancer). I find that sadly the most vulnerable are easier to victimize and it is NOT RIGHT at ALL. people should be SAFE when they are with a doctor or surgeon or anyone who is claiming to advocate for them. Are you familiar with dD. Kendra Campbell and Free Range Psychiatry. She is making big waves helping those victimized by psych drugs & lack of informed consent.
Thanks for the thoughts, I totally agree.
Shelly, from the pharmacy rep I just wanted to share: “I worked in pharma for many years and learned more about the drugs I promoted through online peer groups than from the pharma company I worked for. That limited and highly censored information is what reaches physicians and prescribers. The whole system is so broken.”
The CENSORSHIP is despicable and a true violation of human rights.
So, YOU were part of the problem – you didn’t provide your patients will fully informed consent. You didn’t educate them about the risks of harmful procedures, as the hippocratic oath makes you promise to. You violated patients’ trust, bodies, autonomy, and health – just because you were trained to and were following orders.
The Nazis also did what they were trained to do. They also followed orders, too.
So, what makes you better than them? And what will you do to repent / repay for all of the bad things that you did to people and the ways you harmed your patients?
Bridgette that is why I wrote the article—to reveal the truth of medical education and how we are trained to violate the rights of patients to true informed consent. Thankfully, I was never involve much in procedures (just minor ingrown toenail & removing skin cysts) so mostly had nurses just coming in the room getting forms signed to immunizations in which I never had time (like ALL docs) to truly review the procedure, risks, benefits, alternatives and answer questions (especially with Spanish-speaking patients).
So how did I change once I realized how corrupt the system was you ask? I answered that in the intro:
In my final year of training, I was told to prescribe Premarin (Pregnant-Mares’-Urine-derived estrogen) to all menopausal women—without explaining alternatives or risks. I refused. I was reprimanded. I went to the medical library. I did my own research rather than rely on the drug company or my training program (that received money for their involvement in the Women’s Health Initiative study on Premarin in menopausal women).
Beyond the cruelty to pregnant mares, I discovered risks to my patients (for which the Premarin study was eventually halted). Since I had no time in clinic to share drug risks and alternatives, I held free public library lectures for my patients and community where I reviewed all menopause hormone therapies (including non-drug options) and shared simple, yet comprehensive handouts.
I also opened my own clinic in which patients got 60-min visits and TRUE informed consent (bc we had TIME to talk) and never turned anyone away for lack of money in the 16 years I had my own practice. Got back to the basics of caring with housecalls & more . . .
That’s great – but what about working as a family doctor? How many times did you prescribe medications without informing them about the risks?
I opened my own practice as a family doc & prescribed generics that had been out for decades with KNOWN safety profiles. So everyone got info on any adverse reactions and could refuse any therapy. Super patient friendly & upholding the rights of my patients.
Are generics somehow safer than brand name drugs? There’s so much information about the risks of drugs that’s coming out even for drugs which have been on the market for many decades which were previously considered to be “safe” but often aren’t actually safe. For example: gabapentin / neurontin causing brain damage, fluoroquinolone antibiotics have been found to cause permanent brain damage and nerve/tendon damage (which patients often weren’t informed about), statins and dementia/myopathy risks, the list goes on…not to mention all the risks of vaccines which are almost never discussed.
Did you do independent research to inform yourself about all the risks of these drugs, including reading articles on the harm they cause? The risks aren’t always added to pharma warnings, and by the time they are there have often already been millions of patients harmed.
More known side effects than the new drugs hot off the shelf (that have never been used outside of clinical trials). OF COURSE, finding all the adverse effects can be a challenge with any drug if Pharma is not forthcoming though I do my own research in the medical library and PubMed and try to be as informed as possible so I can inform my patients. I am a HUGE FAN on independent research and listening to my patients.
I think we are totally on the same page Bridgette.
In your books and advocacy work, you ask us to see the perspective of suicidal physicians and how much they are struggling. We are asked to have understanding Andy sympathy for their pain.
How can we validate and have empathy for their pain, when doctors don’t have empathy or validate ours (patients)? I have been treated terribly by most doctors since I became sick with an incurable condition 20 years ago. Doctors have gaslit and turned a blind eye to my suffering, and ultimately drove me to the brink of suicide.
How do I feel sorry for them? I do not see them as the victims, but rather the victimizers. Do you believe this is a similar situation as kids who were bullied who later become the bully? The abused child who hits his child? It seems like a perpetuating cycle of abuse, where doctors are abused and then they callously abuse their patients.
The abuse they have endured does not excuse what they have done to me and other patients, just like the abuse that a child endured does not endure him becoming an adult and abusing children.
The cycle needs to end, somehow. Until then, I am sympathizing with the patients, not the doctors.
YES definitely a cycle of abuse. A cycle of betrayal. And patients are the ultimate victims (though I guarantee when we entered med school we never intended to betray ourselves or others).
Physician betrayal always begins with self-betrayal—the act of choosing to violate one’s moral principles as a doctor leading to patient betrayal as physicians fail to uphold their oath to the vulnerable who rely upon them to act with integrity and honesty. Patients are often betrayed in front of a team of trainees—a process of betrayal grooming. Teachers who offer apprenticeship to trainees build relationships of trust and connection that may end in manipulation, exploitation, and abuse of naïve students who then experience peer betrayal— an act of emotional infidelity to medical peers who then become active participants in the betrayal cycle.
Betrayal between medical professionals is common once indoctrinated into the culture of medicine and can be fueled by jealousy, power-seeking, and fear that can push student doctors, resident physicians, attendings, even close friends and family to act against each other for their own personal gain.
A betrayal witness is collateral damage—a nonparticipant that may be swept up in the betrayal scene such as when I witnessed the cart of dogs pass by my classroom to the mass betrayal experienced by my peers during the dog lab—a mass casualty of human and nonhuman souls.
With practice, betrayal is normalized, even expected of trainees whose participation in unethical acts leads inevitably to habitual betrayal, reinforced by better job evaluations and production bonuses. Once done, betrayal is easier to do again.
Institutional betrayal happens when a medical institution is deliberately disloyal to their stated values of easing suffering and preserving life. Medical schools, clinics, and hospitals may mislead, deceive, and breach the faith of trainees and physicians causing harm through coercion, lack of informed consent, and hypocrisy.
Institutional betrayal trauma occurs when the trusted medical institution that teaches trainees how to be healers fails to protect them and can so deeply contradict what is expected that medical professionals end up blocking their trauma in order to maintain the attachment with their profession. Betrayal blindness is the state of denial among physicians in which they do not allow themselves to see what is happening because the information would threaten their professional standing and world view. When physicians blind themselves to the betrayal and fear of future betrayals, the act helps them survive in a career they believe they can’t escape. Betrayal blindness is a coping mechanism leading doctors to dissociate en masse.
When the medical profession—a career you have pursued for years, a career you love and trust to do no harm does something to shatter the foundations of your sense of trust and world view, the resulting trauma can be severe resulting in loss of sense of self and life-altering betrayal grief that mirrors the stages of acceptance of one’s own death (or the death of a piece of one’s soul when swept up in the betrayal cascade)—denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. As a witness to immense betrayal within the medical profession, I’ve felt them all.
Excerpt from Physician Betrayal: How Our Heroes Become Villains (free ebook download on my website here)
I read your book “Physician Betrayal” and it reminded me of a particularly disturbing class I had in premed. My professor had a PhD in toxicology and he showed us how they tested inhalation toxicity on rats in tiny tubes they were forced to breath toxic materials until they slowly died, over hours.
He said “this may seem a bit scary for you to see, but remember this is just science. And we shouldn’t be afraid of science.”
I remember feeling deeply disturbed by his completely calm and unemotional tone. I imagined how my Jewish relatives felt being gassed to death in Auschwitz, their screams and their terror, and how the Nazi doctors probably had the same level of cool detachment as my professor. My boyfriend’s grandmother met Mengele, who also probably felt this way. I sarcastically made a comment about how Fauci also loved to murder Beagles and that I guess we should just accept “anything” in the name of science. My professor just looked at me blankly and awkwardly.
Another memory from premed is how we had to read about this article studying mating behaviors and neurochemistry of affection / pair bonding in voles (small rodents). Apparently voles pair bond and mate for life. To study the effects of “love”, so to speak, they allowed 2 voles to mate, “fall in love” and then they killed one of them to examine its brain chemistry while keeping the other one alive for awhile to experience the loss and then killed that one too.
The professor talked about this experiment in the most detached, matter-of-fact way possible. I was stunned and looked around to see blank faces. Nobody seemed to care. I felt so disturbed that I finally raised my hand to ask, “Does anyone else find this experiment morally repulsive and deeply disturbing?” Nobody responded. Everyone was too busy caring about impressing the professor to show any emotions or opinions.
In this moment, the Milgram experiment really made sense to me. People will follow orders and do as told, even if it means to betray their own intuitive sense of humanity and morality.
“Science” is a religion which requires its believers to abandon their own values. To keep your moral compass would be betrayal of the religion of evidence-based medicine. But I would rather be a medical apostate than to lose my soul.
I am so stunned every time I reflect on the capacity of “health professionals” like your “teachers” to commit crimes against their OWN humanity by killing innocent sentient animals. Absolutely beyond disturbing. My reaction in med school to the horrors of the UNETHICAL & CRUEL things I witnessed was to become vegan, collect stray animals in my apartment & participate in hunt sabotages on the weekends. Here’s an excerpt from my memoir:
I’m flipping through an alumni magazine I find today on a hospital bench (before packing it in my recycling closet) when I read about a lady who had just retired, cut out this paragraph, and tape it in my journal:
“During this particularly busy era, she earned the lasting respect of her peers, who awarded her a deer rifle at her retirement in 1987, so she could continue her favorite sport. And in ’89 she shot her last buck in Webb County, a tradition she’s continued each fall for more years than she can remember. ‘This is one of the great things about being retired,’ she told me, ‘I was always delivering babies while everyone else was out hunting. Now I have time to hunt.’”
This weekend, I’m not delivering babies because I’m hitching a ride to Sam Houston National Forest for my first hunt sabotage! I’ll be wandering through the forest trying to talk guys out of shooting deer while making lots of noise so animals run away. If that doesn’t work, I’m prepared to stand between animals and hunters.
We congregate before sunrise. Six men and four women looking for hunters. We’re following a guy with a bow and arrow which is particularly horrific since more than half the deer hit by arrows escape to die an agonizing death or either keep walking through the woods with an arrow through their necks that gets walled off from essential organs by scar tissue.
“I’m just here as you hunting buddy,” I explain to the man in full-body camouflage and face paint.
“I love wildlife,” he explains. “I enjoy the thrill of waiting for the deer.”
“Can you help us understand the thrill?” I ask.
“I don’t think of it as killing. I like to show off what I catch—a macho thing, I guess.”
“These animals feel pain,” I explain. “They have families.”
“I wish you hadn’t said that,” he replies.
We follow him around for hours, had some really fascinating conversation, and no animals were harmed.
Animal rights activists are way more adventurous than my med school peers.
We’ve had so many events this year to end animal cruelty and help people be healthy.
Finding animal lovers, I feel validated and a sense of belonging that I’d never felt with my wounded classmates.
On March 20, our Galveston Organization for Animal Life sponsored the Great American MeatOut, part of a national event promoting health benefits of a meatless diet. We asked the American Heart Association for their endorsement of the health benefits of not eating meat.
“We work very closely with the meat industry,” their spokesperson said. “We promote the consumption of lean meat.”
“What are the guidelines for calling meat lean?” I asked. He couldn’t answer. So when I went by the grocery store, I asked the butcher.
“There are none,” he explained. “We trim the fat off the best we can. But the term ‘lean’ has no real meaning or FDA standards.”
Reminds me of the old American guy I met in Spain. He told me he’d been searching for lean meat, but the butcher said, “We don’t have anything like that in Spain.”
“I have heart disease,” the American said, “What do people do here if they have heart disease?”
The butcher replied, “They die.”
Trying to make sense of all the hypocrisy and LACK OF EMPATHY has been a lifelong struggle–and I have always been shocked at what cruelty and horrors are inflicted on others in the name of science. Isabella thank you for your comment. How are you doing now? Are you practicing medicine?
Like many others, I was harmed by psychiatry and was never given fully informed consent for the milieu of toxic mind-altering drugs which my psychiatric pushed on me while reassuring me they were “very safe” and had “extensive & reassuring safety data”.
In my many years ordeal with the damage I endured from psychiatric medications (and the time spent cursing psychiatrists and wondering how they could do something so awful as to lie to me about horrible toxic drugs), I learned that psychiatrists are some of the most sad, disturbed, and mentally ill people I have ever encountered.
My psychiatrist smoked, showed me her own stash of pills (in an attempt to convince me to take mine), was barely able to stay awake during our sessions, and seemed miserable in every way possible.
I went to an ayahuasca ceremony retreat center once to heal from trauma (and help me get off psychiatric medications) and I met a psychiatrist there who joined the ceremony as a participant. She was the most disturbed person there. She screamed bloody murder during every ceremony to the point that she had to be physically restrained. She seemed extremely traumatized and generally miserable.
I have been thinking ever since, why are psychiatrists like this? Is there something about the way they are taught to ignore the human experience and drug/smoke/drink your way to numbness and oblivion, which deeply disturbs and damages their soul?
My mom is a psychiatrist. I have so much to share about what I witnessed growing up with two physician parents who were not in any shape to fulfill their role as parents. I felt totally unsafe in a chaotic and scary environment. My dad worked in the morgue. I felt safer there (as he did) than being around live people because as I wrote in my memoir “dead people never hurt me.”
Excerpt from my memoir on WHY psychiatrists are so troubled and also I think you would find a lot of healing reading the book “Children of Psychiatrists and Psychotherapists” (about how these people can really screw up their kids (as you can only imagine)
OK from my memoir:
Since I was raised by a suicidal psychiatrist, a psychiatric social worker (who died by suicide), a child psychotherapist, and a philosophy major with failed marriages to two psychiatrists, a psychiatrist friend suggested I read Children of Psychiatrists and Other Psychotherapists—the first book to “explore the paradox”—of why “the very group of people who ought to be the best prepared for raising sane, mature, ‘normal’ children is reputed instead to fail at a spectacular and grotesquely comical scale.”
Classic psychology of the archetypal “wounded healer,” a term coined by psychologist Carl Jung, about how a therapist is compelled to treat patients because the therapist is the one who is actually wounded.
There are so many fabulous quotes in that book on psychiatrists. Let me see if I can find a few. . .
To Concerned Patient of Psychiatrists:
A few quotes from Children of Psychiatrists and Other Psychotherapists. (I wish I could find my whole list as I underlined MOST of the book!)
“This book is the very first to explore the paradox that the very group of people who ought to be the best prepared for raising sane, mature, ‘normal’ children is reputed instead to fail at a spectacular scale. “
“Therapists ought to have a slight edge over the ordinary, amateur parent who just muddles along with common sense and Dr. Spock. Certainly they should not do worse. Yet psychotherapists are reputed to fail at child rearing on a spectacular and grotesquely comical scale. Is this indeed true? And why? Or why not? (pg.3)
“Most therapists, most of the time, act like anyone else, for better or for worse. But the therapeutic population includes a sizable minority of people who have problems and who create or encourage certain very distinctive problems in their children.” (pg. 8)
“It is harder to be a good parent than a good therapist. The good effects that therapist parents have on their children are predominantly the result of their personalities and affections, not the consequence of theoretical training. To be a genuinely good parent one must be a good human being, whereas a great deal of help has been rendered to patients by therapists who are personally miserable, self-centered, and even vicious, but who could introduce a little knowledge and objectivity into what had been a totally subjective mess. Conversely, the bad effects of therapist parents are predominantly the result of flaws that afflict them as people rather than by-products of their training, but here the flaws are often much the same ones that led them to become therapists and which encourage them to use therapeutic concepts and techniques in inappropriate ways.” (pg. 8)
In essence the mentally ill psychiatrists can really impact their children (and potentially their patients) adversely. I really wish I could find my complete list of quotes for you.
Hi Dr. Wible, I have been an appreciative reader of your work for a few years now. I saw your blog post in a Facebook group, “Legal Death, in Drugs we Trust” which discusses the widespread problem of prescribed in the USA.
I am the child of a prominent and well-respected doctor, and my journey into the rabbit hole started when I became injured by prescription drugs handed to me (given like candy!) from my very own father. The years of agony and torture I endured from extreme gaslighting, physical and emotional pain and neglect, and not being taken seriously or cared for in the aftermath begged the question, over and over: why and HOW did this happen?!? How could the one person who I trusted with my life betray me (my body, health, well-being, and soul) so profoundly?!
Looking back through my childhood, I realized that so much of my father’s personality was molded and shaped by his medical training. His father was an immigrated doctor living the American dream, so since a young age my father basically never had a life outside of academics and work. He didn’t have fun, go to parties, or experience “life” like the typical boomer. I’m pretty sure he never had an opportunity to form an identity or personality outside of school.
People have sometimes described my father as “emotionally challenged”; the only times I’ve seen him cry are 1) when his dad died and 2) when his dog died. He was never capable of truly connecting to me. Whenever I was sad or had a problem, he wanted to immediately “fix” it, but could never just listen to me or provide any reassurance, words of wisdom, or fatherly support. He generally saw the people in his life as problems to be fixed or puzzled to be solved, rather than real human beings to be seen, appreciated, and interacted with. My family members noticed this too; when my cousin was 5, she had a scar on her face, but it never bothered her. He told her, “you can get that fixed, you know”, and then explained the process of an invasive plastic surgery involving knives and sutures, to correct the scar. To a FIVE year old. To which my aunt replied, annoyed, “she’s a CHILD! She is fine the way she is and doesn’t need anything ‘fixed’”. My cousin told me that day was the first day that she ever felt self conscious about her appearance, and it’s an emotional scar she’s carried with her into her adult life.
My relationship with my father was no different. When I was bullied for the size of my nose at age 14, he offered to pay for a nose job when I turned 18 – instead of helping me accept that my nose is part of my central Asian ethnicity and that there’s nothing “wrong” with it. When I was depressed because of bullying and challenging circumstances, he wanted to immediately drug me with toxic psychiatric pills instead of taking time to help me understand that my emotions were a normal human response to stressful events.
I never felt any level of emotional closeness to my father, and was jealous of my friends who had open relationships where they could tell their dads anything. My brother and I learned to shut ourselves down and not tell him about our emotions or daily struggles – because his solutions would often be invasive, aggressive, and cause more problems than they solved. He worked extreme hours, holidays, and we usually only saw him for an hour or two each day at dinner time before he prepared to be on call or go to bed for the next long day.
There was also no arguing with my dad. His ego and need to be “right” were profoundly overwhelming to everyone – political debates during thanksgiving with extended family often ended in awkward tense silence. I remember as an 8 year old, asking my father how did he know that the drugs he was giving me to sleep were safe? Since humans have evolved for many thousands of years and our bodies never had enough time to naturally adapt to these laboratory synthesized chemicals? Intuitively, it didn’t make sense to me. But he laughed off my concerns as being a naive little girl who knew nothing about the world – and he made me feel humiliated and embarrassed to ask the question. He said that the drugs he gave me were extremely safe and that the “smartest people in the world” proved this fact. The conversation made me feel so stupid and insignificant.
I learned to not ask my dad questions or to argue with him. He sometimes took me into the closet, pulled my pants down, and spanked me if I ever “misbehaved” – an experience so humiliating that I learned to never make him angry. He always had a way of making me feel humiliated for questioning his authority. Questions inspired from my own intuition or critical thinking were constantly discouraged and ridiculed. This made me develop a form of learned helplessness, where I distrusted my intuition and own critical thinking process. I stopped thinking on my own, stopped asking questions, stopped questioning his authority – because my brain had learned that doing so would only lead to the pain of humiliation and disapproval. Ultimately, I wanted nothing more than his approval – so I had to stifle this part of me in order to get it.
Over the years of my childhood and teenage years, I became increasingly dependent on him for my beliefs and decision making. I became codependent on his advice for everything medical-related, because he was the expert and I was the child. And I trusted him. So, I followed EVERY single piece medical advice he gave me – for surgeries (I have hyper-mobility syndrome so I had some orthopedic problems), medications (sleeping pills, antidepressants, anti-anxiety pills, acne medications), vaccines, etc. And every time, the medical procedures hurt me – but my pain and experiences were always invalidated. And I even invalidated myself because I was trained so thoroughly to disbelief my own intuition and experience.
By the time I was a young adult, I didn’t even feel like I had my own identity. Who was I? Besides my father’s daughter? I felt I could never live up to him – a highly esteemed successful physician – but I tried. I killed myself to get straight-A’s. Anything less than an A- would send me into a panic.
I developed a panic and eating disorder (as a result of the stress and also the harmful neurological effects of the psychiatric medications) – and what did he suggest?? That everytime I had the urge to binge on food, I swallow a fast-acting benzodiazepine instead. When the effects of the psychiatric drugs caused me horrific mood swings, he wanted me to take lamictal – a drug which van cause a fatal and disfiguring skin rash. I remember crying because I didn’t want to die, but I also didn’t want to suffer with mood swings. I told him I wouldn’t take them. He thought I was being an uncompliant patient and he threatened to withhold his financial and “emotional” support unless I did. He set me up with the top psychiatrists in the area who handed me a 5-minute questionnaire and decided I was bipolar. I am NOT actually bipolar (several psychologists have since confirmed this), but nobody believed me when I said that the antidepressant withdrawals were mentally destroying me. I was told that antidepressants aren’t addictive and that withdrawals weren’t a real thing.
It continued on this way until I eventually had a serious adverse reaction to a drug which almost killed me and caused me many serious longterm health problems which I still have today. And again, my dad did not believe me. Each time my health got worse, my dad shoved more and more harmful drugs / procedures at me – gadolinium contrast scans (I refused), gapabentin (I stopped them), prednisone (had horrible effects), opioids, mood stabilizers, more psych pills…
If I refused to take a medication, he threatened to withhold his support and kick me out to the streets. I developed serious health problems (including fibromyalgia, severe ME/CFS, toxic encephalitis, arthritis, and neurological disorders) and was not able to work full-time. I eventually got off all medications and told him to stop trying to control me with drugs. He kicked me out of the house and I was homeless for awhile, living out of my car. I cut him out of my life completely. I had to do this in order to survive – I genuinely believed that I would have died from organ failure if I continued to take all the awful drugs he pushed on me. As it was, my brain, musculoskeletal system, nervous system, kidneys and internal organs were already suffering from all the drugs I was coerced into taking for years. Another drug could have pushed me over the edge into multi-system organ failure – I was seriously close.
My relationship with my father is still awful due to all the years of physical and emotional abuse and severe trauma he’s put me through. And he is still incapable of acknowledging that he ever did anything wrong, much less apologizing.
I think my father is incapable of realizing the harm he’s done to me because doing so would crush him. So instead he chooses to believe that he did everything “right”, that his attempts to “fix” me were all standard medical protocols – and that nothing should have been done differently. He chooses to think I am conspiratorial and insane for talking about big pharma selling lies to physicians about the safety and efficacy of their drugs. He chooses to think that all of the other victims of big pharma (and the medical establishment’s harmful prescription guidelines) are also just crazy. He would rather destroy and rip our entire family apart than come to terms with these painful truths.
I believe my father is a victim of the sunk cost fallacy of his medical education – his entire identity is inextricably intertwined with his career as a physician. Admitting that the medical system causes such serious harm would be death to his entire identity and I’m not sure he would survive that. I keep remembering how he cried when our dog died – and I think about whether he performed the dog killing experiment in medical school. He’s never talked about it, but he can’t even stand to watch a movie where a dog is hurt (much less dies), so think it would have destroyed him. Maybe parts of his psyche and identity were murdered in medical school. I often think about what kind of father he would be and what kind of life I would have, if he chose a different profession.
If you read this far, I appreciate it. I think my story confirms your theories about physician’s trauma and betrayal of their own psyches. I have spoken to so many children of doctors who were also polydrugged, harmed, and gaslit to oblivion – and the nightmares they’ve endured. I once dog-sat a family of two physicians, and wasn’t shocked to discover that the dogs AND children were all on Prozac. Their beautiful luxury home was littered with neon orange pill bottles and medical journals which looked more like pharma advertisements than real science.
I’ve joined online physician groups to see how so many doctors are putting their young children (sometimes 3 years old!) on a cocktail of multiple medications, and adding more drugs for each effect that the other drugs cause. My heart breaks for these children because I am sure some of them are suffering the same as me. I am sure some of them will develop health problems, trauma, and destroyed families. And the sad part is that society doesn’t understand us or our trauma – we are often viewed as privileged wealthy kids who grew up wanting for nothing, with silver spoons in our mouths. Sure, we grow up with financial privilege – but society doesn’t understand the trauma and medical abuse we so often endure. Christmas cards feature the trips to Hawaii, the ski trips, the vacation homes – but these are the secrets shoved under the rug, the skeletons in the closet.
I have thought about writing a book called “Children of Doctors” to describe what I and others kids of physicians endure. Many survivors of iatrogenesis believe that doctors hurt them with unnecessary & toxic drugs just for profit, but the reality is that it’s SO much more complicated than that. If it was only about profit, then why would physicians frequently drug themselves and their own children? If they truly knew the nightmare prescribed harm can cause, why would they inflict that curse upon their own family? I want to help people understand how abusive the medical system is to both physicians / their families and patients, and how this inter-generational trauma creates a widespread ripple of harm.
If you start (or we start) a Facebook group called Children of Doctors, I would absolutely LOVE to help you with this. I have interviewed many kids of doctors and I even did a stand-up comedy skit on what it is like to be the child of physicians. Hold on let me find the link . . .
When your parents are doctors (stand-up comedy)
ALSO please read the book, “Children of Psychiatrists & Other Psychotherapists” THIS BOOK HELPED MORE THAN ANY OTHER BOOK IN MY LIFE!
Hey, would you be willing to be interviewed on my podcast about your experiences because I TOTALLY AGREE with this physician psychopathy that creates all sorts of unusual experiences for their children (and many of these experiences are SUPER traumatic)
Reach out here if you want to talk.
Thank you for this important article on this subject.
I have to say, though, that patient compensation for harm caused by lack of informed consent is pretty non-existent. In other words, suing for malpractice is expensive and stigmatized (juries usually side with the trusted MD unless his/her care was so egregious they can’t deny it). One area where so much of this happens is in cosmetic surgery. The comments made by MD’s about their patients and about those who hold them to account are appalling.
Perhaps one way to help with this and other informed consent issues is to have recorded IC sessions. Also we could have a document that the doctor signs in regards to consent.
I think the fear of malpractice suits is overblown and oversold to Doctors. I once had a conversation with a COO of a hospital that sponsored a clinic for low-income people. When I suggested that newly released detainees (from the local jail) be funneled there, her response was about the concern for malpractice suits. Huh? From detainees? That seemed quite ‘off’ to me.
More docs, in a sense, need public health training. Somehow the AMA has created a distrust between the patient and doctor and while I am not sure they way out of this paradigm, I think it really needs to happen.
Patricia (now that I know who you are on Facebook) – Thank you for your wise words. Oh don’t get me started on the liability immunity granted to Pharma while parents and their kids suffer the devastation of drug adverse events. Would have to be a pretty devastating adverse event from a negligent physician act that strayed from the community standard for patient to win the case (smaller events would just be settled outside of court). Recording sessions is an interesting idea. I really think with common surgeries the informed consent could be delivered by video and then Q & A with doctor after (most efficient and best learning tool for people these days). DEFINITELY doctors are very fear-driven. Afraid of almost everything! Just posted a 60-second video of that here: How to overcome fear and live your dream as a healer
Yes, studies show most malpractice suits involve a crappy doctor-patient relationship. Which, in a “hurry them through” environment, means pretty much all doctor-patient relationships. When the patient trusts the provider, they don’t want to sue. Go figure.
Also, with the majority of malpractice suits involving a minority of physicians, everyone should be interested in curbing the bad players. But, nope.
Here in DE, the deputy attorney general declines to prosecute a urogyn who cuts women’s genitals without consent so often nurses call it “The Dr. ___ Special.” The DAG indicates the board will likely issue a “letter of concern.” It won’t be on his public record in any way. It won’t he a problem for him unless and until 2 more of his victims go through a similar nightmare to pull together the resources to file a complaint about a horrifying and triggering event, only for the DAG to dismiss it for bogus reasons and refuse to uphold state law. *Then* there will be an investigation. So, until then, this predatory surgeon is free to mutilate women’s genitals with impunty. Should the board eventually issue a second “letter of concern” the urogyn can move his practice to another state to avoid any mar on his record. Meanwhile, the public has no idea there is a predator in a white coat, condoned by the hospital, which makes money off the Medicaid-approved non-consensual procedures on women’s genitals. It’s a hellish situation, and no legal recourse. The DAG told me I was free to hire an attorney and file a civil suit. Not in DE. Two dozen firms told me I have a valid complaint but they can’t represent me because the settlement won’t cover their fees. A medical malpractice attorney I know in another state says yes, they’re looking for $300K-$400K settlements and I’m not going to get that for genital mutilation. It’s almost like the law is set up against me or something. Why I started “People’s Rally for Medical Rights and Safety” 19 OCT in Wilm DE.
MY HORROR STORY
I was one of those lucky women who never suffered any gynaecological problems in the 58 years I had my healthy female organs intact. I trusted the female GP Helen Bolza who was a GP since 1969 and who did my yearly Pap smear (which she insisted I have every year, despite never, ever having abnormal cells and being celibate for 16 years). I did not know she was in cahoots with corrupt gynaecologists looking for easy prey to use for greed and training material. She forced me into seeing a gynaecologist writing that I had post-menopausal bleeding, which was a blatant lie, as I NEVER had a single drop of blood since my menopause finished 5 1/2 years before. She twisted everything I said to her advantage. She would not take “NO” for an answer. She did everything to gain my trust, so I didn’t understand what was going on. She wore me down until I gave in. I went to the gynaecologist she referred me to so he could examine me, say I’m fine and send me home. I’d never seen him before in my life. As soon as I sat down, he opened her referral letter, and the first words out of his mouth was: “You have bleeding. I’m giving you a curette (D&C).” I was shocked. He didn’t ask me one single question, and he didn’t examine me. I said I had no bleeding, and I was not having a curette, but he would not take “NO” for an answer. He already had me booked in for a curette. I was not told that it is my choice. He manipulated and coerced me until I gave in. At the post-op appointment 2 weeks later, he said I had cancer and had to have a hysterectomy. I said NO this can’t be right. Then he said I had early cancer and had to have a hysterectomy. Again I said NO that’s not right. He then said I had pre-cancer and still had to have a hysterectomy. He’d already sent the referral to MMC (a public hospital I had never been to before, and was not told Monash Medical Centre is a teaching hospital). I was totally naïve and at that time I had no idea that 90% of hysterectomies are unnecessary and to beware of gynaecologists who use the cancer scare to frighten women into hysterectomies for personal gain.. I only went to MMC to be examined, told I’m fine, and sent home. The German Clinical Fellow in Gynaecology/oncology called me in after the waiting room was empty. He then mentioned the bleeding. I was so angry, I said: “Why do you people keep saying I had bleeding, when I hadn’t had a single drop since my menopause finished over 5 years ago, until I was given the curette and bled for 3 days”. The next words out of his mouth was: “I’m going to take out your cervix, your uterus, your fallopian tubes, and your ovaries and I am going to do it by laparoscopy, but still may have to cut me open.” Again I was shocked. I said: “I have no bleeding, I have no pain, I have no symptoms whatsoever, and begged for another option.” He became very angry, his face full and contempt as he yelled at me: “YOU HAVE NO OTHER OPTION. YOU SHOULD CONSIDER YOURSELF LUCKY YOU DON’T HAVE TO HAVE CHEMOTHERAPY. NOT LIKE ALL THOSE WOMEN IN THE WAITING ROOM”, and he flicked his hand toward the empty waiting room and said: “THEY WEREN’T SO LUCKY”. I was shocked. He then answered every question I asked with: You’ll be fine, and insisted I go in, in 2 days. Then he shoved a piece of paper in front of me and pointed where to sign. He did not go through one thing written on that form. I asked him if he’d done laparoscopy surgery before, and he looked me in the eye and told me he’d done hundreds that he could do them with his eyes closed. A blatant lie. I did not know that after I left he added on the form he forced me to sign that he may take out some pelvic lymph nodes as well. He sprung that on me just before the surgery. To make a long story short. He mutilated 6 healthy organs from my body, and God knows how many lymph nodes, as that was covered-up. He botched it beyond repair leaving me wailing in agony every day and bleeding out since he butchered me in June 2005. The morning after he slaughtered my organs, he smugly told me that I was as clean as a whistle. That all my removed organs had been healthy. The whole system took his side and did everything to discredit me and spread the word I was paranoid and unrealistic and that the doctors did NO wrong. They denied that I was in any pain, and kept sending me to psychiatrists who just kept pushing drugs on me and telling me they found nothing wrong in the tests when I kept telling them how much pain I’m in. I’ve never in my life been touched by such evil. I was a victim of fraud, and criminal medical malpractice, and my health and my life has been destroyed by those evil doctors. Why aren’t women warned about these corrupt doctors who trick healthy women into unnecessary hysterectomies. This surgical racket has been going on for decades, and will never stop because the system is geared to protect doctors, and not patients from unnecessary harm…
From my research in the aftermath, I learnt that these evil snakes had the traits of the narcissistic and sociopathic personality and have no conscience. I’m just the tip of a very big iceberg of the HYSTERECTOMY RACKET and deliberate MISDIAGNOSIS….
I’ve never in my life been touched by such evil. I was a victim of fraud, and criminal medical malpractice, and my health and my life has been destroyed by those evil doctors. Why aren’t women warned about these corrupt doctors who trick healthy women into unnecessary hysterectomies? This surgical racket has been going on for decades, and will never stop because as Dr Phil Hammond who wrote his book: “Trust Me I’m (still) a Doctor”
“The system is still geared to protecting doctors’ reputations rather than protecting patients from unnecessary harm.”
Unfortunately I am too afraid to reveal my identity. Afraid of repercussions against me and never being able to practice again. I am in terrible straights because I will not take the vaccine and therefore I am losing all of my career and livelihood. This medical profession with the mandate is horribly cruel to those of us with a conscious and objections. I even worked through the whole first wave of the pandemic and everyone was together. Now I am forgotten and deemed worthless just because I see the data on safety for the vaccine differently for my own personal situation. I no longer have any faith or hope in our profession or anyone in it when they have made the decision to do this mandate with no other options or accommodations. What a cruel group of people–they aren’t even good enough anymore to be called a “profession”. It is just abuse and cruelty to take away everything someone worked for and has (like my home and health insurance) over this.
Thank you. To quote Winston Churchill, “You have enemies? Good. That means you stood for something.”And Angela Davis, “I will not accept the things I cannot change.” Sincerely, Karen Griffin 🦄🌹
Thanks Karen — absolutely agree!
I have been a surgical nurse for over 20 years. I have seen many spinal fusions. My daughter recently had spinal fusion for her scoliosis, which was no small decision for us to make. My husband is a PA who does interventional radiology procedures and must consent procedure patients. I have witnessed the consent process multiple times. I always feel like my biggest job is to watch my patient’s reactions as they consent and to notice if they truly understand what they are consenting to. I don’t think patients truly know what they are consenting to and blindly sign because a doctor put a paper in front of them. This goes the same way for anesthesia.
I have always asked how Pharma convinced 92 Million women that they have a deficency in horse pee! Guess this explains it! And it is not just the poor pregnant mares that are put right back kn the rape racks (yes that is what they call them because that is how they rape them with a fist full of sperm to keep them pregnant) but it is also the poor male babies born to those mothers who are basicly cast off. What a horribly barbaric life to live for all involved including the patients!
AGREE 100%!
Follow “Duchess Sanctuary” on Facebook, Instagram to see the FREE horses saved from Pharma torture.
Thank you very much! This info helps validate my anger about the non-consensual surgery a urogyn performed on me. He removed healthy tissue from my genitals, after he promised he would not make any external incisions or take any tissue. The state of DE declines to hold him accountable even tho he’s done this to so many women the nurse called it “the Dr. ____ Special!” Instead, they made up the idea that I signed away my right to informed consent when I signed the consent form. That one sentence in it negate’s the definition of informed consent held by the rest of the world. SO…”People’s Rally for Medical Rights and Safety” was born, to spread awareness about patient and provider rights and safety, bring together survivors and care providers for support, and join our voices for greater administrative and legal protections. Rally updates at http://www.ShaySeaborne.com/rally.
I am so disabled in agony by evil doctors who preyed on my trust and medical ignorance…
Medical Rape: Coerced Hysterectomy, Oophorectomy, and