Medically unexplained symptoms: time to and triggers for diagnosis in primary care consultations - Houwen et al BJGP 2020

• Received May 27, 2019.
• Revision requested June 18, 2019.
• Accepted July 16, 2019.

• © British Journal of General Practice 2020
  
  
  https://bjgp.org/content/early/2020/01/13/bjgp20X707825
  
  
  
  

 

100%

It's mostly a reflex, the "default" option. There should never be a default option, especially one that is not validated and has a huge history of failure but it's the fact that it is the default option that makes it common. It is a belief and beliefs require no evidence. This is the core and foundation of MUS: belief and nothing else. It has no place in modern science and even less so in the practice of modern medicine.

But this is not the right way:

They will behave very differently knowing they are recorded, keeping the worst behavior that is common out of consideration. There is interesting reflection over the superficial triggers for this, mostly having to do with patient presentation, but there is also a much wider variety of such superficial markers that would make the response to the exact same overall presentation and wording lead to very different outcomes if said by an introvert adolescent girl vs a tall, broad-shouldered middle-aged man wearing an expensive suit. It's entirely a crapshoot with zero consistency. Which we have been saying for decades so congrats on figuring out the obvious. I mean it, this is remarkable.

However I think this should be larger and bolder somewhat, even underlined and larger still:

As a matter of fact, it is 100% of the thought process. All belief brought about by improperly validating an ideological structure into medical practice despite all evidence showing it is a useless anachronistic artifact of pre-science thought.

 

Blog previously posted here, Blog: The Science Bit by Brian Hughes