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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
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