| > Massage doesn’t cure tonsillectomy Tonsillectomy is prevented by figuring out why the tonsils are becoming inflamed in the first place. I said "bodywork (massage/etc)" because most people aren't familiar with the different kinds of bodywork that were developed over the course of the 20th century. I would place the emphasis on "etc". Massage is a general treatment, while other forms of manual therapy are more specific in their beneficial effects. You might know some "physical therapists" who can work magic with their techniques. > The treatment cures (in around 97% of cases) tonsilitis. Removing the tonsils will prevent the tonsils from becoming inflamed, on account of their removal. But certainly you would agree that if the cause of the inflammation could be determined, it would be better to address that factor than to just remove the part? The girlfriend I mentioned in the post was born with her umbilical cord around her neck, which is how I knew that she'd probably benefit from "bodywork". When she came back from a class trip to Mexico, a few weeks after we'd met, the lymph glands on her neck were rather puffed out. I'd already made her an appointment with the good "physical therapist" (to hopefully deal with the unresolved somatic problems associated with her tonsil extraction ~15 years before). The "physical therapist" found that one of her ribs was out of place (certainly due to carrying a heavy bag over her shoulder while stomping around the border cities). This displaced rib was pinching on the lymphatic channel (maybe not the correct terminology). After releasing the rib to its proper location, the therapist said the lymph glands would probably go down over the next 1-3 days, and that if they didn't normalize she should seek further medical care (x-ray/etc, to rule out conditions she could have caught in Mexico). The swollen lymph glands entirely went away over the following week. I recently took a new friend to an actual physical therapist with similar training. This woman sprained her ankle ~6 to 10 years ago. The post-injury surgery made her ankle problem worse (I understand the surgeon accidentally cut a nerve that shouldn't have been cut)... This woman was just trying to hold herself together, but was collapsing. The physical therapist helped this woman out quite a bit, and she was surprised at being able to make several trips to unload her car a few days after the appointment. My point is simply that people's conditions usually have a broader context than their presenting symptom. |
However, you are so far off point on the tonsillectomy.
Let's take a slightly different condition. A patient has gallstones, causing ascending colangitis. The treatment (which you would describe as treating only the symptoms) is to remove the gallbladder, a cholecystectomy.
The cause in this instance is being a mid 50's woman, slightly overweight, genetic predisposition, high fat diet.
Your implication is that because the Doctor is treating the symptom, they are doing a disservice to the patient?
The reason I am defending this so strongly, is because it is only a stone's throw from the implication you initially started with - 'that doctors treat symptoms, not causes', to 'Doctors/The medical-industrial complex is with-holding the cure for cancer, because if they fix it they don't make any money'.
As though no doctor, or scientist in the field, has ever died or watched a family member suffer through that or some other insidious disease.
Doctors are human, they make mistakes, they act on evidence that is only partially formed (and have to in order to act in a timely manner), and their actions are often not fully explained to those who they are treating.
We can and should do better. But slinging mud on my profession I can not sit idly by and abide.