Helen Salisbury: Resisting the temptation to offer advice

When people consult their GP they often arrive with a clearly defined medical problem—a pain, a lump, breathlessness, a rash—and what they’re asking for is a diagnosis, treatment, and, if necessary, a referral. However, the solution to a problem isn’t always obvious or simple: a patient may present with back pain and insomnia, but further discussion may reveal relationship problems, stresses at work, or self-medication with alcohol in an attempt to deal with isolation and low mood.When patients come asking for help because they can no longer cope alone, it’s not easy to disentangle the strictly medical from the social, the psychiatric from the psychological. After investigating the physical symptoms a referral for talking therapy may be useful (or ideally a link so that patients can self-refer), but it will be several weeks at best before help arrives by that route. Reaching for an antidepressant prescription is also an option,…
Read Original Article: Helen Salisbury: Resisting the temptation to offer advice »