Posted by kylenn on August 3, 2006, at 19:53:25
In reply to Re: YAWNING/Wellbutrin dose too high, SE seizures, posted by wacky on July 31, 2006, at 15:59:48
I just want to emphasize that my depression caused me significant difficulty in my profession.
I am still under a "consent order" by the medical board; which stipulates that I see my shrink (and I have been on "prn" visits since '04, this ruling was in July '05); nevertheless, I must maintain a relationship with my psychiatrist due to the consent order because he has to send a bi-annual status report to the board.
This information is also available to the public; this is my personal medical information, now.
I am VERY opposed to any joe bloe being able to look up my name and contemplate my "mental illness" This information, by the way, is permanent. It will never go away. No matter how long I am in remission, this information will be public knowledge for anyone who is curious, or just lacking a new gossip topic.
They (the medical baords) expect medical professionals (especially physicians) to "self report" mental illness. Now, tell me, why would anyone in their right mind (pun intended) want to do that? Basically you end up placing your career, your livlihood and your reputation in the hands of 10 or so complete and dispassionate (and perhaps even sadistic) strangers, usually a mix of lawyers, laymen and turncoat physicians. The reason why this is so horrible is that the medical boards are the "self police" of the profession. It is their job to make sure that the public is not endangered by impaired physicians. I can understand the basis for it, but just like any other similar agency, it is terribly flawed. For example, in my own state, physicians with drug addictions that get "caught" are allowed a "first pass" through the system, essentially, the fact that they are "impaired" can be kept private the first time (but not the second time) they are "busted". However, for depression or any other mental illness (in their book there is no difference between paranoid schizophrenia and depression--no gray at all just stark white and midnight black)
There is NO "first pass" option. I found this out the hard way, and I was wishing I had just been a drug addict (and I told them this sad but true fact). In fact, I was essentially initially in the "first pass" pathway, until I convinced "them" that I was not an addict, that my overdose was completely a symptom of my depression. After I convinced them of this fact, I was informed that since I was not a drug addict with depression, but was just a depressed person who took too many pills one night, I would not be allowed the "first pass" and I would automatically be publicly punished for my offense. In other words, if my MAIN diagnosis was drug addiction and my SECONDARY diagnosis was ddepression, it would have been kept private, and not reported to the various agencies that all have beaurocracies (sp?) of their own.
As far as "endangering the public", any one who has ever experienced a major depressive episode can attest to the fact that hurting another person is the last thing on your mind. Most of the time, there is an intense feeling of guilt related to imagined or overblown hurt that you may or may not have caused! The pain is turned inward, without exception.
Additionally, I never, not once, was compromised on the job. I was informed by my physicians that job competency is usually the last thing to be affected by depression; and in my case, I have seen paperwork that I completed THE DAY BEFORE my overdose, and it was completely accurate, concise, and medically sound. I, myself, was amazed to read the things I had written; I could see no hint of the inner turmoil I was experiencing in the notes on patients (and these were extensive notes) I made on that day (or any other day for that matter).
I have survived the worst of it, and am now back at work and in remission from depression for over 2 years now; but I am always wary of how easily my life could change.
I just wish there were some way to really end the wrong way physicians are handled with similar problems that I have had.
More physicians would get treated if there were no serious repercussions to their careers/income/livlihood/and reputations by disclosing (and therefore getting treatment for) their illness. It is said that the number of suicide attempts among female physicians is 20 times higher than that of the
females in the general population. Therefore, there may be 20 times more depressed female physicians than there are depressed female non-physicians.
If the incidence of depression in the population is approximately 2%, that would mean nearly half of female physicians will experience depression?!
I know that the number of "impaired physicians" is listed by the reporting agencies at around 1%. How many physicians out there, then, are depressed (or have some other undiagnosed mental illness) but are not getting treated (or treating themselves, as I was, for the most part)?
Even if the number is not 39% (of untreated mentally ill physicians) which does seem high, why should ANY physician go untreated??
Because to admit it , at this point in time, is nearly career suicide. You do not go to school for 23 or more years just to throw it all away because you suffer from depression. You keep it to yourself, if you are smart, and deal with it in secret. Getting "caught" being depressed is the worst thing that has ever happened to me.
I am glad to be on the other side of this experience, now though. But I sure do not think it should have taken nearly 3 years, with 2 of those years being out of a job and spending over $30,000 jumping through hoops for the various boards.
I filed bankruptcy in 2004, and my mother went through over $100,000 over her retirement money in order to help me through financially during those two years that I had no income (I also had 3 kids to support!).
I love medicine. I don't think I could do anything else (and there are not many jobs out there for physicians who can't practice medicine.
Try getting a receptionist job or a retail job as a middle-aged MD. Wouldn't that raise some eyebrows. You'd have to lie and as a female, I could say I'd been a housewife all these years but my husband left me/ died/ or became disabled and that is why I am 44 and applying for a job at the factory.
What would a male say?
Anyway, if there is anyone out there with any ideas about how to fix this, and especially anyone in some sort of position with some political power, I wish someone would take a serious look at this.
I am not about to make any noise, I am towing the line. Once I get a few years out from this, I might risk speaking out publicly, like at some kind of conference in front of other physicians.
But right now, I am going to lay low.
My tail is tucked for now.
But one day, maybe my experience will help someone else. I wouldn't wish what I've been through on my worst enemy.
poster:kylenn
thread:672524
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/work/20060706/msgs/673373.html