There’s a new physician making the rounds, and his name is Dr. Google. He has a terrible bedside manner, an opinion on everything, and he’s convinced your mild headache is a rare, incurable brain fungus. He is, of course, the trusted medical advisor for the “I did my own research” patient.
An online community asked real doctors for their most cringeworthy encounters with these self-proclaimed experts. The responses are a hilarious and horrifying gallery of diagnoses gone wrong and medical advice confidently ignored.
More info: Reddit
#1
I am a dental student. One patient in particular is pathological liar. During one visit, they claimed to have gone to medical school. Next visit was that they did dental Army. Last visit was that they had a PhD.
The patient will say things like “Hey doc do you need me to move my head mesial or distal?” No. I need you to move your head right. “Hey doc, are these cavities being cause by the anaerobic pathology microbes?” No. They are cause by you eating snacks all day and not brushing.
Image source: Macabalony, wavebreakmedia_micro
#2
A related story from my friend, a Gynecologic Oncologist.
Basically a woman had early uterine cancer, but refused surgery. She wanted to explore alternative treatments like coffee enemas (?) and meditation. She somehow managed to get an audience with the Dalai Lama who told her to go back to western treatment.
Image source: drleeisinsurgery, BBC News
#3
Had a young woman with recurring UTIs that began after a recent partner and with no STDs; went through the standard questions trying to figure out what could be causing them and eventually found out she had been lubricating with jelly. *Not* KY jelly. The mixup had literally been a joke on House. It took me some effort to keep a straight face, but we eventually resolved the problem and she stopped getting UTIs.
Image source: rawrthesaurus, ihorga
Self-diagnosing your inevitable demise is by no means an isolated case. A study of 2000 adults showed that more than half use the internet to find their diagnoses, and around 75% believe they know better than their own doctors. The “Dr. Google” era has well and truly taken a firm grip on this generation.
Many people found their insurance paperwork too hard to grasp, citing this as their reason to trust the web oracle. But should we really let the fear of a little paperwork lead us so far as to put all our trust in the robot overlords? By the sound of these cringy stories, we shouldn’t be so fast to open WebMD after all…
#4
My dad is an Emergency Nurse. He experiences the same thing doctors in the ER do, maybe more so because he’s the one in the rooms more often. Anyway here’s a good story from him:
I had a patient come in with several pages he printed off the internet. He kinda slammed them down and said, “This is what I have.”
He had bloating, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, bloody stool, and fever among other things. He insisted he had Schistosomiasis. He was being a real jerk about it like we’re wasting time since he already knew what he had.
So, I asked when did he get back from Africa. And he said, “Africa? I’ve never been to Africa. What the hell would I be doing in Africa?”
I proceeded to tell him that Schistosomiasis is a parasitic disease one gets while swimming in the Nile River or other rivers in developing countries like in Southeast Asia.
He got pissed off at me because he thought I was being a smart. He got seen and diagnosed with gastroenteritis (the stomach flu). The bloody stool? He had hemorrhoids.
Image source: cazman123, pressfoto
#5
I didn’t treat this patient but I was on shift when this guy came in with tombstones on his [ekg] in the setting of chest pain. He told the ED doc, “I want a second opinion before going to the cath lab.” This ekg is unmistakable. The interventionalist had to come down to the emergency department to tell him he was having a heart attack.
Image source: Dyspaereunia, Dyspaereunia
#6
80+ y.o. patient who was declining with multiple diagnoses and about 3 decubitus ulcers. Daughter was adamant that her father be kept on his strict “paleo” diet because that would “supercharge” his healing. She had a stack of diet books. He simply wasn’t getting enough nutrition to heal the ulcers. He didn’t like the diet at all btw. At some point you kind of have to stop being polite and just tell patients/ family members bluntly that you don’t have time for this nonsense and what you recommend and they can do what they want and just document everything. It happens a lot but she sticks out.
Image source: jdubs333, freepik
If “Dr. Google” was the gateway, the wellness influencer is the final boss. These days, it’s not enough to come to the doctor armed with a printout from a questionable website; the know-it-all patient now arrives with advice from a charismatic TikToker who claims you can “detox your liver” by drinking a celery-and-cayenne-pepper smoothie.
The American Psychological Association has raised alarms about this trend, noting that false health information spreads like wildfire on social media, especially when it’s delivered by a confident, attractive person with great lighting. The doctors on Reddit are on the front lines, battling a tidal wave of patients who are convinced their complex medical issue can be solved with a discount code for a green powder.
#7
This one happened to my ex father in law, and it’s funny, but it’s not. He was a surgeon (very gentle, soft spoken guy) and came out to tell them the biopsy results, to which they responded “Praise Jesus, it’s malignant.” (He had to explain that ‘malignant’ meant bad.).
Image source: kd3072, Drazen Zigic
#8
Not a doctor, but a patient whose mother was like this. The Doctor had to speak to me on the side because of it:
My grandmother has Crohn’s disease. Very very badly. It skipped my mother and her brother. When I was 15, over the course of 6 months, I went from being 5’9 and 190 pounds to being 110. I was a skeleton, extremely anemic, and coughing up blood. My mother was CONVINCED it was something else. I forced her to bring me to a doctor and she spouted off all these possibilities. She then talked about what she yahooed. Not even googled. Yahoo. About genetics and such. And “crohns can’t skip generations”
Well the doc said “just in case. We’re gonna run some tests”
Long story short I have crohns in my throat and small intestine. So does my cousin. It just skipped a generation.
#9
70 yo female tripped and fell 2 days ago. She came it with hip pain but reports after the fall her nose was bleeding – she had landed on her nose. About a year prior her dentist had messes up an infraorbital nerve block and caused some swelling in that region but that all was resolved. This old lady is now convinced her nosebleed after falling on her face is related to an “infection” from the dental issue a year ago. After multiple back-and-forth on the etiology of the nosebleed, she became the first patient I raised my voice and put down an authoritative “no, you are wrong, just stop it”.
Just when doctors thought they’d seen it all, a new challenger has entered the ring: Artificial Intelligence. A recent study from MIT Media Lab delivered a truly terrifying insight: people tend to over-trust medical advice generated by AI, even when it is demonstrably and dangerously wrong.
This is the next evolution of the stubborn patient. Instead of a theory, they’ll have a full, seven-page diagnostic report generated by a chatbot that also writes sonnets about cats. The stories from doctors in the thread are hilarious now, but just imagine the conversations they’ll be having in five years when a patient confidently argues, “But ChatGPT said my tennis elbow is actually early-onset vampirism.”
#10
Med student here…on my pediatrics rotation a mother refused vaccines for her kiddo after “educating herself.” When prompted as to what she was using as her source, she replied, “my own brain.”
Lovely.
Image source: Docwiththesocks, freepik
#11
I work for an optometrist and it was the month before school started and a woman brought in her son to have his eyes checked for the first time. Seems like a pretty reasonable thing for any parent, even if he was a little older than usual for a first eye exam. Better late than never I guess. The mom was well spoken and appeared fairly intelligent. Everything went as normal, the doctor examined the boy and ended up prescribing glasses. When the doctor was explaining to the mom that her son had to wear his glasses all the time since he’s nearsighted and basically can’t see clearly past 5′ in front of him. And will definitely need glasses for school. For some reason this caused a switch to flip in the mom and she spazzed out on the doctor, saying that her son doesn’t need glasses and that the doctor is only saying that he does because he wants to sell glasses. She says that she only brought her son in because there was some form for school that needed to be filled out and that doctors are all a con artists trying to push unnecessary medications and interventions. The doctor tried to calm her down and explain that he’s only trying to help them but that she was free to get a second opinion and gave her a copy of the kids prescription and sent them on their way. About four months later the lady is back asking for another copy of her son’s prescription. Apparently the first semester midterm results were in, and her son failed them all, because he couldn’t see the board in his classes and needs glasses!
Image source: sosanostra, freepik
#12
I’m a corpsman, not a doctor, but I once had a patient tell me that there was no credible research that smoking was bad for one’s health.
Okay.
Image source: 5213, fabrikasimf
Now, here’s the plot twist. The old-school, “doctor knows best” model of medicine is officially on its way out. A study from King’s College London found that for too long, a patient’s own experience and perspective were ranked as the least important factors in a diagnosis.
The truth is, you are the world’s leading expert on one very specific subject: your own body. There is a huge difference between a patient who announces, “I have a rare mitochondrial disorder because I read a blog about it,” and a patient who says, “I know you think it’s just a headache, but this feels different from any headache I’ve ever had.”
#13
Not a doctor but am a medical technologist. There are plenty of iamverysmart moments but this one was recent.
Did a fingerstick for a patient, ensured the little cut stopped bleeding, and then put a band-aid on it. Told her to collect a urine sample for testing. Test came back strongly positive (4+ reading) for blood. She complained to the doctor that there is NO WAY she has blood in her urine, and that the blood from her fingerstick must have entered the urine, throwing off her reading. She said it was my fault that I did her blood test before her urine test, and I obviously made a mistake.
She repeated the test later in the afternoon, still at 4+. Came back a week later, still at 4+. The look on her face when I told her “sorry, ma’am, your result is still positive” was priceless.
Image source: EarthwormJane, freepik
#14
Optician here
We had a patient who refused to let us use the tonometer, a machine for checking ocular internal pressure to diagnose glaucoma. He said that puff machine gives you glaucoma and we weren’t going to pull that on him.
He told us his father got an exam, and had glaucoma after using that machine. His uncle and brother also had no signs of glaucoma, and after getting the puff test, both people had been diagnosed with the disease.
Glaucoma doesn’t have any outward symptoms before you start going blind. This guy just told me he has a very strong familial disposition to glaucoma, and refused to be tested for it.
Edit:spelling
Edit2: woo that took off.
Also, puff isn’t that bad guys. Try contacts, your eyes stop fighting back pretty quick. The puff is a lot better than the old machine, it just hit you on the eyeball with a little ball on a lever.
Another edit: I also have plenty of patients that don’t understand family history. I interview patients directly so we don’t have any real paperwork, and too many people can’t answer simple questions.
“Do you or any of your direct family members have diabetes?”
“Yes.”
… your self or your family?
Alternately, if yes to family members, they start listing their spouses family or step children. Not how genetic disposition works.
Or after getting “no” answers to diabetes, hypertension, glaucoma, thyroid problem, heart problems,etc, I ask if they take any medications.
“Yeah, atorvastatin, thyridizine, metformin, and low dose aspirin.”
Oh so you have everything I asked about. Check.
Want some more?: way too many people don’t understand presbyopia. As you age, your lens hardens and can’t focus up close anymore. Of course when this is explained, I get a lot of people who believe they’re way to young for bifocals. No. Sixty is not too young for bifocals.
“Why doesn’t the doctor have to wear bifocals?”
He does. He’s wearing progressives, you don’t see the line.
Or after trying to get used to multifocal lenses for a few days, giving up and demanding we remake them as single vision, and then getting mad at me again when they can’t read with the.
“I never needed bifocals before, why can’t you just make me regular glasses? Regular glasses always worked just fine!”
Yeah you used to be twenty. Also you came to see us *because you can’t read with your ‘regular’ glasses.*
In the same vein, these same people complaining about they’re own insurance to me, because progressives are expensive.
A lined bifocal is covered entirely. Progressives cost a lot.
“I can’t have lines in my glasses like an old person”
Then you want progressives. This easily triples the bill.
“Why are you so expensive? I need to be able to see!”
Yeah. You need a bifocal. You don’t need a progressive, you want a progressive. Insurance pays for what you need, not want. I actually had a guy make me talk to his insurance agent about him needing “medically necessary” progressives. A progressive lens is never medically necessary. Stop being cheap, and listen to what I say. I am not a salesman, I am a medical professional, stop acting like you know better than me.
Image source: CaptainTheGabe, The Yuri Arcurs Collection
#15
Where to start!
1. Picture a middle aged man; his index finger is 5 x the size of the rest of his fingers. It smells, it’s leaking pus, there’s necrotic tissue. Basically one huge infected cancerous finger. He was a firm believer in not taking any sort of medication; including antibiotics or chemo. Departed a few weeks later, but he did manage to tell us we were all idiots before he passed.
2. Patient was a young child who came in with an extremely high Blood Glucose level. Once she was stable we did some teaching and kept her for a few days for observation. For some reason every-time I checked her, her levels would be extremely high although we were appropriately treating her. Turns out her family would bring her fast food for every meal and hide it in the side table. More teaching and resources were put into place.
3. Had a mom in hysterics because she was convinced that her neighbor’s, friend’s, step son’s, teacher’s dog has MRSA so her baby was going to die. It took everything within me to not tell her that most of the hospital staff have MRSA. But it took 3 hours for me to finally calm her down after I called: infectious control, her pediatrician, gynecologist, and family doctor. Yes I had to call all these people; yes they laughed at me; yes she was beside me the whole time questioning their judgement.
I love my job, but at times it makes me crazy!
Edit: just had some amazing people inform me with several scholarly documents that MRSA isn’t as prevalent as once thought. It’s only about 5% in hospital staff. Thank you wonderful people :).
Image source: xxsheaxx, arminka19899
So, how do you use the vast resources of the internet without becoming the star of your doctor’s next dinner party story? A study on the physician-patient relationship offers the perfect road map: be a partner, not a challenger. It’s okay to do your research, but the presentation is everything.
Instead of walking in and announcing your self-diagnosis, frame your findings as a question. “I was worried when I read about Condition X, and it seemed to match my symptoms. Could we talk about that?” This simple switch transforms you from a cringeworthy adversary into an informed member of your own healthcare team. The goal is to be a helpful research assistant, not to try to grab the scalpel yourself.
Do you put your trust in Dr. Google or the person who has dedicated their life to understanding the human body? Tell us your thoughts in the comments section below!
#16
Was working at a pediatric urgent care. Family brings in their three year old unvaccinated son with autism for a weird rash.. they couldn’t give me any reason why when I asked them about his vaccination status..
Image source: madetosurvive, irinafoto
#17
Patient had a hard time getting pregnant. Finally conceived but miscarried. Patient has a D&C so she can try again, this time with medical intervention. We monitor her blood to ensure the pregnancy hormone is gone before beginning treatment. But she keeps coming back with high levels of hormone. Docs are worried because she might have some retained placenta or pituitary disorder and this could be super bad for future fertility.
We call her in for a conversation about the hormone levels not going away. After talking together about what might be wrong, they are going to go home and think about further tests. She says “I need to go. I have an appointment at the weight-loss center for an HCG shot.”
Turns out that she is on the HCG diet. HCG IS the pregnancy hormone. And this was after an hour of the docs saying “We don’t know why you have these constant high levels of HCG in your blood and we are worried”.
Image source: KaylaChinga, prostooleh
#18
RN here. I see some crazy stuff, but one thing that stands out was the time I was admitting a guy to the hospital. I can’t really remember what for but he was about 400lbs, diabetic, heart disease, you name it. Anyhow I’m at the computer going over some admission questions with him and his 10 family members who are crowded in the room with him. A few minutes in he starts complaining that he’s thirsty. He needs something to drink RIGHT NOW. So I get on my phone and call the nurse assistant and as her to bring in some ice water. As soon as the words are out of my mouth the whole family screams “NOOOO! NO WATER! HES ALLERGIC TO WATER!”
Well this is gonna be a problem. Turns out the guy had been drinking nothing but sprite and sweet tea for years because of his “water allergy”.
The next question the wife had was “where are we all supposed to sleep?” The whole family, 10 people, were planning to stay at he hospital with him.
You can’t make this up.
Image source: jsellars8, EyeEm
#19
Said it before, I’ll say it again. Had a patient insist:
“I didn’t have a heart attack, I had a myocardial infarction.”
That’s just the technical term for a heart attack, genius.
Image source: ffxivfunk, Drazen Zigic
#20
-My aunt (who has varicose veins, pretty obvious to anyone who sees it) once asked me why her legs hurt and what those bluish lines under her skin were. I almost went on to explain to her about dilated veins when she interrupts and decides for herself that those are her nerves. Dying nerves. And the blue stuff was blood clots inside the nerves.
I’m a med student.
-I was doing a respiratory system examination on this guy who frequently(about once a month) gets admitted in the general ward with complaints of breathlessness. He’s had COPD for a couple of years. Quite bad. And he tells me that he isn’t going to quit smoking because ‘God’ told him not to. When asked why, he tells me that the people who are relying on him for their daily livelihood won’t survive if he stopped. I went on to ask him if he meant the people at the cigarette factory or the health industry. He didn’t get the sarcasm though.
-Patient comes to the surgery clinic with complaints of mass on DRE. (Now I wasn’t there the first time he came). But the surgeon wanted to do a couple of investigations and advised him to get admitted. The guy decided he doesn’t want to. Couple of months later, he comes back to the clinic. Apparently he went to one of these alternative medicine places or whatever and they had tied this metal wire(not exactly sure why) around the mass. By then, this mass has eroded through it and was bleeding and had gotten much bigger. Turned out to be a cancerous growth.
Image source: SomeYorktown, Alina Rossoshanska
#21
Not an MD, I’m an RN that works with oncology (cancer) patients, some of which are on clinical trials.
I got a patient and, before starting his chemotherapy, reviewed some of his lab work with him. I told him his glucose level was 73. Normal range is usually between 70-100. He got really upset at this point, and asked him “what’s wrong? Your labs are within range!” And he said “I need it to be zero.”
I said, “what? Why would you want your glucose to be zero?”
He said he’s trying to meet requirements for a new clinical trial that requires his glucose to be zero.
I told him, “I don’t know what clinical trial you’re trying to get into, but if your blood glucose was zero, you’d be dead or dying.”
He was not convinced because I’m “just a nurse,” so I sent a message to his MD asking them to educate their patients better.
Image source: brownskinned, freepik
#22
So – the patient had low blood pressure – so their self treatment: eating more fatty foods in order to decrease the size of their blood vessels in order to increase the blood pressure within their system…
Image source: anon
#23
Not a doctor but… was discharging a patient and going through his instructions. I advised him to take his antibiotic with food. He asked, “Should I roll it up in a piece of bread?” I told him he could try eating a sandwich instead.
Image source: Lillyville, syda_productions
#24
Any variation of this…Which I get all the freaking time.
Me: So how are things going with your diabetes?
Them: I don’t have diabetes
Me: them why are you talking metformin/victoza/whatever
Them: I USED to have diabetes.
Then replace diabetes with hypertension/antihypertensives etc.
Or when I ask them what medical diagnosis they have and they say none while taking a ton of meds.
OR when they mis name a body part…. Prostrate, tendant, neuterus. To name a few.
Image source: seawolfie, freepik
#25
Was working at a clinic. I was speaking with a non-controlled diabetic patient about her sugar intake and she said she drinks a 32 oz soda everyday. I ask her if it’s regular or diet and she replies with “It’s half-regular. I let the ice melt first so there isn’t as much sugar in it”. Sorry but that isn’t how it works.
Image source: Friskypharmer, gaby.campo
#26
Most of my own stories go along similar lines to “patient has chest pain driving a coach load of school children, thinks its indigestion, swigs bottle of gaviscon, later diagnosed with a huge heart attack”
My favourite ever story from a colleague: a patient comes into A&E with abdominal pain.
As part of the work up he gets an abdominal X-ray which shows the problem as clear as day.
The colleague has then proceeded to remove, from the patients back, an 8 inch replica of Nelson’s Column (the statue in the centre of Trafalgar Square, London)
On showing it to the patient, the response was “Oh that’s Nelson, he lives up there.”.
Image source: AberrantConductor, katemangostar
#27
I have one. I got this from my friend, who is a doctor on the children’s ward in a rural hospital. These parents bring in their child whose hair is infested with lice. The lice was visible to the naked eye and could be seen crawling on the child’s clothing. While the medical staff examined the child, in order to determine a course of action, they discovered the child was covered in a white powder and smelled heavily of chemicals. They asked the parents what were the substances and the smells emanating from the child. The parents said, quite matter of fact, it was Sevin Powder and flea and tick spray they used on their dogs on the family’s farm. Needless to say, social workers were notified about this case.
Image source: habitual_wanderer
#28
Anytime someone refuses to vaccinate their kids.
Here’s just a small sample of some of the reasons I’ve been given:
(1) causes autism
(2) made from aborted babies
(3) big pharmacy scam
(4) unnatural
(5) my kid cried when you gave him his vaccines last time
(6) I never got these diseases as a kid, so my kid doesn’t need the vaccine
I feel sorry for your kids.
Image source: DrThirdOpinion, freepik
#29
I had a patient who was a completely non-compliant diabetic, smoker, morbidly, who had his first heart attack at 45.
His blood pressure was also super high.
And instead of taking his anti-hypertensive medications, he went to the gym.
In the gym: he would sit in the sauna for a very long time, and sweat a lot, and lower his blood pressure by becoming dehydrated.
Image source: bitbitch6969
#30
During my rotation at pediatrics we had an unconscious 16 y.o. male with a prior history of Type 2 diabetes. The mother had come home from work and found him acting “strange” with slurred speech and stumbling around so she immediately drove him to the hospital where he passed out in the car. Running the full “Rainbow” for blood draws and tests the kid had a blood glucose of 285 and a BAC of .11 Near as we can guess the kid was drinking after school while his parents were away, got too drunk, didn’t know that alcohol turns into sugar and wound up drunk and unconscious from both the alcohol and the lack of insulin.
Image source: JustarianCeasar, rawpixel.com
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