The ailments you describe though can certainly be debilitating but require no underlying diagnosis. Me and my mother have horrible migraines, no one knows why but it doesn't matter because I was prescribed a medicine, didn't work. I was prescribed a second one and it worked and it is frustrating and it sucks but quality of life is the same.
For all those ailments, we can treat stomach aches, dizziness, headaches. But when one day you're relatively healthy and 3 months later you can't walk then you NEED a diagnosis. Its like when you get stomach aches vs stomach aches plus throwing up for 99% of the food you eat or bleeding stools and frequent constipation then you get a diagnosis to figure out what is going on, usually a colonoscopy/MRI for IBS or UC.
For most things we don't need a proper diagnosis. A ligament tear grade 1,2,3 can be treated without any radiographs. Often similar conditions can be treated with the same exact splint or therapy. There is no need to further diagnose if quality of life can be the same with less than 6 months of treatment and medications.
But when you can't work or do normal daily life functions al of a sudden, you can't just give up and say too bad. Unfortunately if I had Medicaid that is exactly what would have happened. Doctor classifies it under a broad diagnosis requiring little tests and you're screwed for life. Since I had ppo from work, I went to a bunch of doctors until I got a clear obvious diagnosis. Now that I have a diagnosis I can improve.
Also, if problems aren't certain as they are chronic, widespread or hard to diagnose you see certain specialists who are trained to diagnose. You don't see a general physician
To be clear, I'm not at all saying that false negatives are acceptable. I'm sorry that your migraines went undiagnosed for so long and am happy to hear that you were eventually helped.
I just wanted to point out that it is a complex issue because there most likely are a significant number of patients who have pyschosomatic pain. And because of them it's, unfortunately, difficult to achieve comprehensive testing. (But I don't want to sound like I'm blaming this group very much. Stress can be terrible, especially when it's chronic. Though freeloaders are a different problem..)
> Also, if problems aren't certain as they are chronic, widespread or hard to diagnose you see certain specialists who are trained to diagnose. You don't see a general physician
This is actually (imo) one of the largest failings in the UK's various health systems -- Diagnosticians as you have them in the US, do not exist. The entire system relies on GPs keeping up to date on various diseases and symptoms. This means that a lot of the time diseases that typically present with vague symptoms, like cancer, can go undiagnosed for years.
For all those ailments, we can treat stomach aches, dizziness, headaches. But when one day you're relatively healthy and 3 months later you can't walk then you NEED a diagnosis. Its like when you get stomach aches vs stomach aches plus throwing up for 99% of the food you eat or bleeding stools and frequent constipation then you get a diagnosis to figure out what is going on, usually a colonoscopy/MRI for IBS or UC.
For most things we don't need a proper diagnosis. A ligament tear grade 1,2,3 can be treated without any radiographs. Often similar conditions can be treated with the same exact splint or therapy. There is no need to further diagnose if quality of life can be the same with less than 6 months of treatment and medications.
But when you can't work or do normal daily life functions al of a sudden, you can't just give up and say too bad. Unfortunately if I had Medicaid that is exactly what would have happened. Doctor classifies it under a broad diagnosis requiring little tests and you're screwed for life. Since I had ppo from work, I went to a bunch of doctors until I got a clear obvious diagnosis. Now that I have a diagnosis I can improve.
Also, if problems aren't certain as they are chronic, widespread or hard to diagnose you see certain specialists who are trained to diagnose. You don't see a general physician