Startling Stats

I ran across an article titled, “Routine physicals don’t save lives.”   In a study conducted by the Nordic Cochrane Centre, they looked at 183,000 patients and evaluated the efficacy of their physical exams.  The study reported that, “Patients who had regular health check-ups died from cardiovascular disease and cancer at virtually the same rates at those who did not have regular check-ups.”  They also found that both groups die of all other causes at about the same rate.  The researchers of the group concluded that “General health checks are unlikely to be beneficial.”

Please don’t misinterpret this data and decide that physical exams are pointless.  The information from exams is useful and very indicative of problems with physiology that can lead to disease.  But what are we doing with that information?  For instance, if you had a physical and your blood came back with high cholesterol, what should you do?  Most likely your doctor would recommend a prescription to help lower your cholesterol numbers.  But the reason that outcomes from physical exams aren’t better than those who don’t get checked is that far too often managing the numbers on the exam with drugs is where it all stops.  Let me ask you this: If you lower your cholesterol number effectively with medication, do you still have a cholesterol problem?  What most likely happens if you go off the drugs?  Did you ever ask what is causing my cholesterol to suddenly be high in the first place and what do I need to do to address this cause?  Physical exams and doctors are there to identify the problems and co-manage the solutions with the patients who have the problems.  But there has to be an active part on behalf of the patient beyond just taking a pill to suppress the numbers.  In my opinion, it’s not that physical exams aren’t working; it’s that we’re not doing enough with that information.  With all the drugs being given out for blood pressure, cholesterol and other risk factors, shouldn’t we expect a decline in the rates of cardiovascular disease?  I can assure you that no such decline has occurred.  We as patients have to start taking an active role because you cannot just medicate a lifestyle problem!

In the old days, doctors would say, “I’m concerned that your blood pressure is getting high and I want you to try this medication for a couple months to see if we can’t control these numbers.  In the meantime, I want you to follow this diet, reduce your salt intake, quit smoking, look for causes of undue stress and begin a program of regular exercise and we’ll check this again in two months.  Don’t you think that this approach is more likely to create results?  Hopefully your doctor is telling you what is causing your conditions and providing you with solutions to address these causes.  If he or she is not, you need to ask them and be willing to do the work beyond taking a pill a couple times per day.  This approach w orks every time!