Slow Medicine Case Study

When one thinks of slow medicine you think a slow process. A process when doctors take there time with their patients really getting to know them and understand their issues. Slow Medicine is just taking the time to talk, examine and even re-examine a patient. Ask advice from other doctors. Go over lab tests and X-rays of patients. To think about a diagnosis and if they should have the patient continue or discontinue medications or try a new medication. There is no harm in taking the time to examine a patient and to make sure they are being properly diagnosed. Many doctors today look for the quick fix, anyway to make a quick buck. They don’t take the time to really understand their patients and properly treat them. Not the way Victoria Sweet did. Victoria Sweet took the time getting to know her patients, reading over their charts and thoroughly examining each and every patient she saw. Sweet showed me that some doctors could have true compassion for their patients. Victoria Sweet worked with many patients at Laguna Honda using a Slow Medicine approach. The main patients that illustrated a Slow Medicine approach would be Mrs. Muller and Janice Gilroy. This paper will discuss Slow Medicine, how it is illustrated in two …show more content…
Muller might not have survived. Dr. Sweet did what no doctor, nurse or social worker did. She took the time to analyze Mrs. Muller’s case and eliminated factors that could have been preventing her from her recovery. If Mrs. Muller’s original doctor did a simple x-ray then it would have reversed months of suffering and disability due to a series of inappropriate diagnoses and costly treatments. “Perhaps we could avoid prescribing the newest medicine if an older, cheaper one would do”(Sweet 140). If the hospital and doctors would stop fixating on the new medications, treatments and money they might actually notice that Slow Medicine has more of an effect on patients and can save