A physician should discuss all aspects of his or her patients’ health, dietary choices and the types of medicines the patient may be taking, in order to ensure that the physician has all the necessary information to treat illnesses and ailments. However, most doctors do not discuss dietary supplements with their patients—an omission that could lead to serious health problems.
A program of study that recorded the doctors’ visits of 1,500 patients over a twelve year period revealed that only 350 of them discussed dietary supplements with their physicians. The researchers discovered that doctors were often more thorough in discussing herbal supplements than they were “normal” vitamins and minerals, due to herbal treatments’ higher likelihood of adverse reaction with conventional medicines. However, the doctors were still very lax in discussing the wider range of dietary or vitamin intakes of their patients.
Doctors are charged with being aware of, and treating, so many critical aspects of our health and our lives, and they should be thorough in knowing the types of medicines or intakes their patients are taking in order to make a full assessment of each one’s health. A doctor who ignores this imperative is taking serious risks with the well-being of those who seek treatment from him or her. If you’ve been injured by a doctor’s negligence, you should consider speaking to an injury attorney. The personal injury lawyers at our Virginia-based law firm have combined over a hundred years of medical malpractice experience, and we know how to fight for you if you’ve suffered harm from a physician’s careless behavior. Suffering a medical injury can be frightening and incredibly costly; knowing where to go first is important.