Is The Medical Industry Catering To Hypochondriacs?
Most of us know people who we would consider to be hypochondriacs. These people seem to enjoy being sick so much that they often claim to be infected with an illness they have heard someone else is suffering with.
Sometimes they stake claim to an illness because they want the attention they perceive to be gained from those around them who lavish them with sympathy and interest. Other times the hypochondriac may truly convince themselves that they suffer from a disease after learning of the stated symptoms.
The radio and television commercials of today seem to cater to hypochondriacs by bombarding us all with drug after drug to treat the latest, seemingly trendy, “disorder” or “condition.”
You’ve likely heard the commercials that ask you if you are experiencing certain conditions and, “if so,” ask your doctor about their new drug. “Ask your doctor to see if xyz drug is right for you” they typically say.
One recent “disorder” that has received its own commercial is known as “Shift-Work Disorder.” The symptoms are sleepiness, irritability and inability to concentrate. One supposedly develops this “disorder” when working the night shift instead of sleeping. Does this predicament really deserve its own disorder? Is it not common knowledge that if someone doesn’t sleep they’ll become sleepy, cranky and irritable? And isn’t the best “treatment” for this “disorder” a nap? Or if taking a nap is not possible at that moment, how about a cup of coffee? It certainly doesn’t carry the side effects of Nuvigil, a drug that supposedly treats so-called Shift Work Disorder. Its side effects are stated as:
Nuvigil may cause serious side effects including a serious rash or a serious allergic reaction that may affect parts of your body such as your liver or blood cells, and may result in hospitalization and be life-threatening. If you develop a skin rash, hives, sores in your mouth, blisters, swelling, peeling, or yellowing of the skin or eyes, trouble swallowing or breathing, dark urine, or fever, stop taking NUVIGIL and call your doctor right away or get emergency help.
Stop taking NUVIGIL and call your doctor or get emergency help if you get any of the following serious side effects:
- Mental (psychiatric) symptoms, including: depression, feeling anxious, sensing things that are not really there, extreme increase in activity (mania), thoughts of suicide, aggression, or other mental problems
- Symptoms of a heart problem, including: chest pain, abnormal heart beat, and trouble breathing
- Common side effects of NUVIGIL are headache, nausea, dizziness, and trouble sleeping. These are not all the side effects of NUVIGIL. Source
Did you note that those are not even “all” of the side effects of Nuvigil? Give me a “cup ‘a Joe” any day over that list but again ask yourself, when did lack of sleep become a “disorder”? What kind of world do we live in where people can be diagnosed as having a “disorder” when their body is simply reacting to a lack of one of its most basic requirements? This has got to be one of the most obvious cases of the medical industry ignoring the natural cure that is, in this case, known as sleep and carries with it benefits rather than side effects. And drinking coffee, though not without negatives, is certainly safer than yet another side-effect producing drug to add to the 12 prescriptions that the average American already has filled in one year here in medication nation (source).
A hypochondriac would likely watch a commercial for Nuvigil and say to themselves, “I feel sleepy when I’m at work. Therefore I must need Shift-Work Disorder.”
Wikipedia defines Hypochondriasis as “excessive preoccupation or worry about having a serious illness. This debilitating condition is the result of an inaccurate perception of the body’s condition despite the absence of an actual medical condition.”
Note that it says that it is “the result of an inaccurate perception of the body’s condition despite the absence of an actual medical condition.” From a business standpoint, a hypochondriac is a hot prospect. This person believes they have need of a drug or some other treatment even though they don’t have an actual medical condition.
Marketing 101 will teach you that you look for what the consumer wants and then develop a product to give it to them. Toy companies, food companies, cell phone companies and all the others pay large amounts of money to study their market and develop a product for them. Why would we expect less of the medical establishment? They market to us on radio and television, they have to make a profit as well and there are already plenty of stories of pharmaceutical companies bribing doctors to prescribe their drugs, drugs that weren’t tested well enough that were pulled from the market because of the harm that they did and countless other examples of the medical industry behaving like any typical business in that they want to get their product to market as quickly as possible in order to make the most money possible. There’s nothing wrong with trying to make money unless people are being hurt and that is what is happening. So why would it surprise us that the medical industry might be catering to people who really don’t have anything wrong with them? It certainly seems that way. Take note of these so called disorders:
- Shift Work Disorder
- Restless Leg Syndrome
- Orthorexia Nervosa (healthy eating “disorder” where you want to eat healthy all the time)
- Intermittent Explosive Disorder (if you’ve had more than “3 angry episodes in your life”)
- Road Rage Disorder (if you get mad when someone cuts you off in traffic)
- Oppositional Defiance Disorder (when children disobey)
There’s much more to add to this list and it will continue to grow because drug companies have found a way to sell their drugs to people who aren’t really sick thus further padding their foreign bank accounts. And the quickest way to sell drugs is through disease mongering. That is, inventing, then marketing non-existent diseases to a gullible population that has accepted the idea that nearly every human behavior is, apparently, a disease.
Here’s a newsflash, healthy people don’t take drugs. Used for any other reason other than short-term issues, drugs make you sicker and the more drugs you take the more side effects and sickness you’re likely to face in your shortened lifetime.
Do not allow drug commercials to brainwash you into becoming a dream customer for the medical industry. Having a bad day is perfectly normal. Feeling sleepy because you’re working the night shift is perfectly normal. When you’re sitting down and your legs are wanting you to get up, surprise, you’re still normal! You just need what we all need: good nutrition, less stress, more loving relationships and more sunshine. If you disagree and want the attention of having a “disorder” and the man in the white coat to tell you that you’ve got something wrong with you I’m sure there’s a psychiatrist or medical doctor out there willing to invent a disease on your behalf and give you a lifetime supply of liver-killing drugs.
But there’s a better way. If your body and/or mind isn’t feeling as healthy you wish, take a close look at your diet and exercise (or lack thereof). That’s where the real cause of virtually every degenerative disease is really found. You do not have a “deficiency” of brain chemicals or anything else conventional medicine is trying to push on you but certainly doesn’t have a test to prove. Don’t fall for the false authority, the pseudoscience, the psychobabble, the drug pushing and the disease mongering that currently defines modern medicine in the western world.
Get on a good diet high in organic vegetables, drink water that’s been purified of chlorine and fluoride, get a blood test to ensure you are getting enough vitamins and minerals, get plenty of exercise and get a confidant, counselor or prayer partner and you’ll be well on your way to real, disorder-free health.
