Guardian article - what is your opinion on seeing the same doctor all the time?
Seeing the same doctor can save your life – and AI can never replace that
Ann Robinson
AI is more embedded in our health service than ever, but it can’t replicate the trust built up with a doctor over many years
I take her point, but I don't really think it applies to thyroid patients. And, it does depend a lot on the doctor. l I've never seen a doctor I would want continual 'care' from.
Nice idea , but if I want to see a particular doctor, who knows my medical history, at my Gp surgery have to wait 6-8 weeks!
Fat chance of seeing the same doctor at my practice, unless I can predict 4 weeks in advance when I’m going to be ill...
My surgery doesn't allow booking appointments in advance - you have to keep phoning every morning on the off chance there'll be a free appointment., SO I don't bother going may more.
The days of the family doctor are over with multi GP practices preferred and GPs retiring in their 50's plus part timers.
Ordering a repeat prescription online the other day I noticed patients are now encouraged to email the GP. They also do a call back to phone requests for appointments. Don't think they actually like seeing people face to face and avoid it all they can.
I'm afraid with the treatment I've received ( or rather not received) and the constant fobbing off my daughter is getting, leaving her in constant pain, my opinion of doctors is at an all time low.
The current NHS anniversary hyperbole on TV is just plain sentimentality, aimed at making us feel grateful and humble (and therefore not critical) !
I’ve seen the same doctor for at least 15 years. He knows all of my health issues, treats me seriously as he knows me and it works very well. He will let me try things or vary doses etc. Problem with a different doctor is that they start from scratch each time so ‘wait and see how it goes and I’ll check you in a couple of weeks and we’ll do something then if it’s not sorted’. They want all their own tests.
I tecently took a guy I know who had just tried to commit suicide to see a doctor and they talked it through and gave him a mild antidepressant and said ‘come back in a week’. A week later it was a different doctor who rubbished the previous one, stopped the antidepressants and said ‘you’ll be fine. Come back if you have a problem’ That’s not helpful and it’s confusing. He needed consistent care and understanding of his situation. Only someone who knows him and his history can help him and different doctors can’t do that. It takes too long. The same doctor doesn’t need to. He already knows the story.
That was exactly my thinking same Dr for 15 years, genuinely nice, caring man, unfortunately a hopeless Dr who ran a single own Dr practice. He kept me ill for years by utter negligence. He closed his practice 6 months after my getting 2nd opinion. He was being sued by a family where he had missed 2 obvious cancers in the parents who died within a year. I will not be dazzled by a lovely bedside manner again. Other than my thyroid/tt (2009) I had never seen a Dr since I was a child, it was a massive shock to me that many of them are lazy paper pushers with little professionalism or knowledge.
Very good points. Its easy to be hoodwinked by a doctor who seems caring and warm but doesn't have the critical skills.
I do think one great thing about this forum is we can get good information on what to expect from a doctor.
Never believe a word I write.
I try but absolutely nothing should be taken as right or true without being checked out and verified.
I much prefer seeing the same doctor as they get to know you but that hasn't been the case at my surgery for some time and if you have a bad doctor I suppose it's not good to continually see the same one.
A fresh eye over health issues can be very helpful but I do take the point 
AI is about the same as many GPs - just look it up on the computer. Look at the guidelines, don't listen to the patient or look at her, and prescribe the recommended pill (or an anti-depressant).
I very much agree. Its care by flow chart most of the time.
And at worst it's accompanied by a lot of hand waving and repeat appointments that waste even more time!
And referrals to specialists who do even more blood tests which come back "normal". Each appointment costs me a day's business income, so It's really not worth it.
It depends on the doctor. I wouldn't trust my ex GP to put on a sticjing plaster. I spent seven years going back repeatedly with the same symptoms only to be told he didn't know what was wrong, come back if it gets worse. When I just happened to go in one day when he was on holiday because the pain was keeping me awake at night and "had to see his locum", as the receptionist put it, she correctly diagnosed me with hypothyroidism. When I had bad results with Wockhardt (always made me ill) he decided I was cured and took me off levothyroxibne and for the next few years refused to accept there was anything wrong with my thyroid and tested me for everything under the sun. If I was still seeing him I'd probably be dead by now - there was a fortnight in 2015 I felt so ill I honestly thought I might not wake up in the morning, which was pretty scary given I was only 48 at the time. I bet an Artificial Intelligence would have had a better chance of diagnosing me correctly.
Helvella, you beat me to it, my internet was down.
I remember the good old days of a family doctor who knew you, your family and what was wrong with you. I don't think I have seen the same doctor twice in the last 3 years. Lots of locums, some good some bad.
It was different docs who kept messing with my levo, up, down, keep it within the TSH range, you know the stuff, that definitely made my thyroid health worse. I avoid them as much as possible but this particular practice seems strangely keen to test my TSH at least once per year and then rattle off the usual threats about heart attacks and osteoporosis.
A few months back we were told to check on Google before bothering a doctor. Wish they told the GPs about it first as they don't like Dr Google!
getting an appointment whether face to face or by phone seems to be a battle for most people, never mind seeing the same doc.
What they don't tell you is how to achieve the long-term relationship with your GP that they are are claiming to be so good.
It is all rather snakes-and-ladders. Move house, back to the bottom. Doctor moves or retires, back to the bottom. Doctor shown to be less than wonderful, back to the bottom.
Unlike real snakes-and-ladders, they didn't put any ladders in.
As someone has already said, being stuck with a bad doctor, especially if you have faith in them, can have dreadful consequences. At least if you see different ones, you stand a chance of one of them being somewhat better than the rest every so often.
Very well said Helvella
If I have trust in the doctor and they are empathetic and competent I prefer to stick with that one. Otherwise I ditch an unsatisfactory one as fast as I can. I avoid seeing any GP if at all possible! I don’t think I’d mind AI, but it depends on if any rubbish has been programmed into it in the first place as to how good it might be I’d guess. I’d be quite happy to dismiss any clap trap from either GP or AI!
One of my concerns about AI is how it is validated and maintained.
How does new research or new patient experience get into the system? Some of that might be done by its own collection of feedback but without knowing an awful lot more (far more than my brain can take in) there could be so many ways in which it fails to update, or updates wrongly.
There is definitely room for AI in medicine
You would not believe the amount of medical errors that occur
NHS to scrap paper prescriptions under plan to save £300m 
“Could a ‘renegade’ doctor save your life?” | Daily Telegraph | 28 July 2014
Blimey! Thyroid disorders etc in a broadsheetHow getting the right GP turns out to be a matter of life and death
When a doctor says “its your age" and doesn’t provide appropriate treatment. Part 1 Why this is illegal. (What to do about it in Part 2)
