Let’s focus moment on the irony of being faced with the news of a condition that you don’t know anything about, yet are being expected to make decisions about. You might be wondering: Why not simply take my doctor’s advice? The first answer to that question is: Because your physician may not be willing to tell you what to do. Physicians want patients to be active partners, to understand their own condition and to essentially “buy into” the treatment path. Active patients are easier for physicians to work with. And there is a practical side: In today’s managed care environment, physicians have less and less time to help patients to make these decisions. When I was growing up, I often heard an old saying that went something like, “when you’ve got your health, you’ve got everything.” As I get older, I understand more and more that good health is not something we can take for granted. The system is giving us no choice but to take charge of our own healthcare, especially in times when our health is at risk. This all seems perfectly logical until one of us is sitting in the office of our physician, or a specialist we have been referred to, and we are given an unexpected, or a dreaded, diagnosis.
Now what?
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