Have doctors become sales reps for pharmaceutical companies?

My view on the state of the current health system and what you could learn about that.

Photo by Olga DeLawrence on Unsplash

Recently, I’ve paid more attention to my medical appointments, and they’ve unraveled a sad truth to my eyes: Doctors treat the symptom not the person. They look for the quickest way—normally through drugs—to “heal” the symptoms, but they don’t look beyond to find and fix the root of the problem.

Is no secret that western medicine made a mistake a few years ago: they divided mind from matter.

Of course, this gave us a lot of knowledge on each specific part of the body, but it made us blind to the holistic connection of the body, not just with all it’s different parts, but also with the mind.

Sure, I think this is useful for society on one side. The expert knowledge that we now have of how each body part works, its different layers, and functions is a leap for humanity.

But the fact that we seem to have forgotten about the mind-body connection, to me, is something that has put many people at a risk of developing life threatening diseases and in danger of some nasty secondary effects from drugs. And more importantly, it has taken away people’s own accountability and responsibility for their own bodies.

To understand how this is experienced in the real world, let’s take a look at my two latest medical appointments: one with a gastroenterologist, and one with a dermatologist.

So, about a year ago, I was falling ill every two weeks. I would come down with cold-like symptoms: headaches, coughs, weakness, fatigue, you name it. The symptoms would be so strong that they would put me in bed for about two to three days in a row, and then they would suddenly disappear.

I visited a general doctor, wondering what it could be. She took my blood and some other routine tests and everything came up normal—and some not just normal but great. 🫠

While scratching her head, the only thing she could maybe think was wrong was that the cough I had might not be due to a virus, but be due to untreated gastritis and acid reflux, so she referred me to a gastroenterologist.

When I saw him, he used some fancy machine to look at the back of my throat and indeed there was inflammation all over that was typical of acute acid reflux and chronic gastritis. He looked at me very seriously and told me that if I didn’t manage this properly, I could develop esophageal cancer in the years to come—fearmongering much??

He immediately took out his prescription book and wrote down four or five medicines I HAD to take everyday in order to fix my problems. The one thing I would give him as a positive, is that he also prescribed me some lifestyle changes like meal times and foods I should avoid.

I smiled throughout and thank him for seeing me, and took the prescription note to the nearest pharmacy. To my surprise, all the medicines he recommended would take me back about a quarter of my monthly paycheck at the time. But, as a good stubborn samaritan, I said, thank you, but didn’t buy any of it.

For the following weeks and months I followed his lifestyle changes, had small dinners three hours before bed, avoided the foods he told me, and drank home-made bone broth every morning. This last one was based on my hippie background and not on what he told me. Seeing how after the first week of doing that already brought me a lot of relief, I knew I was on the right path.

Three months after our first appointment, I had a control check up with him. I’ll be honest with you, I was nervous. Would my lifestyle changes and bone broth have been enough to show a significant improvement? Or had I made a huge mistake and put myself in danger?

Well, I walked in and he asked me how had it been taking the medicine, I lied (something I truly hate, but wanted his unbiased opinion) and said I was super good and followed the indications to the letter.

He positioned me again on the fancy machine, and he said “mhm”, “great”, “right”. Then he asked me to follow him to the office. We sat down, and he said “Well, everything looks great! There’s almost no inflammation anymore. Keep taking the medicines for another three months and you’ll be back to full health.”

What!? My hippie way of healing myself with only lifestyle changes had the same results as some expensive medicine? Then what was the point?!

As a chemistry graduate, I know basically all drugs have secondary effects, some might be worth it considering the seriousness of the symptoms, but for the majority of people I believe they’re not.

So, why would a doctor, just prescribe me a bunch of stuff that would not only cost me financially but probably also health wise in the long run? Of course, I’m priviledged in some way and I could, with a bit of effort, pay those medicines and go about on my marry way. But what about those that don’t have the financial means? Why would medical professionals just tell them to put money down the drain instead of taking charge of their life and make the little habits and routines that could heal them in the exact same way as those medicines for a fraction of the cost?

To tell you the truth, a part of me was ecstatic that I managed to fix myself without him even doubting it must have been some expensive drugs, but another part of me was fuming. Is this modern medicine? With everything we know is this the best we can do?

I doubt it.

I continued doing my lifestyle changes and now I only notice the acid reflux come back when I stop following those changes, which is understandable. And I put my anger away and thought to myself, maybe this is one isolated case. Maybe he just wants to move quickly through patients, fix them quickly and move on. Maybe he doesn’t trust people can take responsibility of their lives and follow some simple habits.

Whatever, I put it aside in my brain and continued with life.

That is, until I visited the dermatologist a few weeks ago.

As a little backstory for you, I had dealt with very bad cystic acne during my early teens all the way to my mid twenties. So much so, that I eventually was prescribed and took seven months of Roaccutane (a very aggresive acne medication that can give you depression, harm your liver, and produces malformation on fetuses).

However, that finally did the trick and my skin was perfect after that. But before that, doctors had put me on antibiotics for years (that destroyed my gut microbiome), gave me oral contraceptive pills (causing me to gain weight and deal with mental health issues), and all sorts of harsh creams (that caused my skin to now be super sensitive). Funnily, or sadly enough, they never once asked me about my lifestyle or mental health, but we’ll get to that later.

Now, I took Roaccunate in 2020—yes, during the pandemic, which was a blessing in disguise because no one had to see me on the awful state that that treatment left me for five out of those seven months (basically, first few months my acne got much much worse and then all the skin on my face started to peel off as if I was a snake shedding my old skin). But after finishing the treatment my skin had never been better.

That miraculous improvement lasted until December 2024, when I started to first develop a bunch of tiny acne heads on my middle cheeks that made the skin on that area feel like sand paper. Since I was traveling, I thought, changes in food, probably different laundry detergents, and the European cold were to blame, so I didn’t think much of it.

However, when I arrived back to Bogotá, the sand paper feel disappeared, and instead I started to develop that painful cystic acne that I used to have but this time on my lower cheeks and top of the neck. I still thought it was just my body getting used to being back so I dialed down on my skin routine and gave it time to go back to normal.

But it didn’t.

After about a month of being back and seeing no progress, I decided to go to a dermatologist. My mom and boyfriend had their own opinions on what could be causing it, and the internet had other opinions, so I thought seeing an actual professional would be better. At least for an accurate assessment.

I arrived to the doctor, again, this doctor had a fancy machine that took pictures of my face and showed her the blood irrigation of the skin, how deep the acne was, and the different stains and marks on my skin.

She asked me about my history with acne, and the next thing she said produce a strong emotional reaction in me. She said: “There are only two things to do with this kind of hormonal acne. One is going back to Roaccutane, but for nine months, and the second is taking spironolactone (an androgen, male hormone, blocker) used to treat hormonal acne and antibiotics for a minimum of three months.”

As you can imagine, the emotional response (I almost cried, if I’m honest) was warranted, since that was a flashback to the previous years of basically torture through drugs. I said: “I’m sorry, I will not take Roaccutane again unless every inch of my face is covered on acne that doesn’t go away with anything else. And, due to my past history of mental health and how I’ve responded to hormonal pills, I will simply not take any medicine that interacts with my hormones again.”

And lets be honest, yes, I had some persistent cystic acne now for a month on the bottom part of my face and top of the neck, but to me that was not enough to possibly go through a whole myriad of secondary affects that could affect my gut microbiota, give me depression, damage my liver, and f#ck with my body, pardon my french.

So, without her asking (honestly, why didn’t she?), I asked her if maybe, with my heavy training schedule, and the fact I was taking multivitamins and various protein shakes every day, if that could somehow be affecting my skin. To which she responded, “Yes, it’s been seen in some cases that overtraining, taking vitamin B supplements, and taking protein shakes could impact acne, and precisely this kind of acne you have”.

When she said I opened my eyes as wide as I could and I looked very seriously at her. And said to myself: “Oh, really? So could it be that maybe is my lifestyle at the moment that’s affecting my skin and I shouldn’t go through MONTHS of harsh treatments to fix something that maybe in a month of taking out those things from my life would be enough?!”

Just understand I was PISSED, but I kept my cool.

She insisted on at least taking the antibiotic, I let her put it in my prescription note, but I kept asking her what else could I do in my life to reduce it? She said a few more things like avoiding lactose and touching my face (duh!), and making sure I’m resting well.

I took the prescription note and thank her, she told me to come back after three months to see how everything was, but that I should come back with my liver exams just so we could start Roaccutane (disregarding my absolute denial and emotional response about taking Roaccutane again…but whatever 🙄).

I did buy some of the creams she prescribed, because in that I trust her. After all, I buy most of my skin care based on what I see on Instagram, and I know that’s not the way to go. 😅

But, I didn’t buy the antibiotic, and I’ll go back in three months just to prove her that all I needed to do was to avoid certain things and to actually listen to my body and take rest seriously. Things I guess I kinda knew, but was curious to see what a professional would say, and to be honest, I did want a dermatologist to give me a skin care routine.

Now, that was about two weeks ago. Ever since I’ve stopped taking the multi vitamin and protein shakes, and I’ve reduced my training so it is not as taxing on my body. And lo and behold, my skin is already healing. Sure, I still have some of the scabs and scars from it, but it is healing. There’s about 50% less active points and how irritated it was is now a thing of the past.

Once again, my view of medical professionals was down on the ground. Really? The dermatologist was willing to put me AGAIN through a severe treatment that should only be used for the absolute worst cases of acne on a whim? Ready to prescribe it after only having known me for 1 hour and without asking about my current lifestyle? Despite the fact that that would probably further damage my skin and make me hate how I look for a few months before it actually fixes the what, 10 active pimples I had when I saw her?

IT’S RIDICULOUS.

And sure, here we could maybe have a go at the Colombian health system. But to be honest, I’ve experienced it as well in the UK and saw the same thing. Doctor’s rather “fix the symptom” quickly with drugs than actually take the time to heal the person from the root of the problem.

Maybe this is the result of a burnt out system that doesn’t have enough resources (doctors and money) to actually spend time on each patient.

Maybe it’s the fault of our current culture that wants results quick, no matter the mental, physical, and financial cost.

Maybe is because we’ve forgotten about the impact on lifestyle on our overall health.

Maybe is because doctors don’t trust patients to be able to take responsibility of their own life and health.

Maybe is because western medicine focuses too much on each part of the body and not on the holistic function of body and mind.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

There might be a thousand different explanations as to why this is happening. Heck, maybe is just the dozen or so doctor’s I’ve seen, maybe you all have had different experiences. But whatever it is, it’s not right.

In my opinion, drugs should be a last resource.

Our bodies were divinely made to function properly without any pain or discomfort, and the way to first address any problem that comes up should be through habits and lifestyle, then mental health, and only if those two really don’t work, then use drugs.

But to me the fact that it goes first and second, and only drugs, is a problem. It makes doctors be sales reps of pharmaceutical companies. It makes them look as if they’re more worried about you taking a medicine than you actually healing from the inside out.

Each human being is so different, but if you’re only focusing on one part of their bodies and their symptoms and checking a list to see which medicine to prescribe, you’re not advocating for the health of the person, but for the sales of the medicine. That’s not how we should be looking at our health.

Enough rambling, but as you can see this pisses me off. It angers me to see how those that don’t have the knowledge are being sent hefty bills for medicines that might put them at risk of developing a bunch of secondary effect, and that it all might not even be needed in the first place.

It really does piss me off.

Especially, because due to this bad rep and lack of trust on the medical profession, people are becoming way waaay too sceptical of science. Because they don’t understand that science is not the problem, the problem is how the knowledge is being wrongly used by pharmaceutical companies and the medical profession.

So, instead of giving proper information for people to heal on their own, this mass of people that not only distrust doctors, but science as a whole, is being created and they would take whatever weird poisonous thing an influencer is selling on Instagram because they think that’s the only way to go. See what I mean? We’ve corroded the good name of science and we now have people doing all sorts of dangerous things instead of just dialing back and following a proper mental, and physical routine and diet.

What to do with all this information/rant?

What’s the takeaway message here? It’s simple: you must take responsibility of your own life. Don’t let doctors just prescribe you a bunch of pills for something that’s not life-threatening. Ask them questions, research, and just be honest with yourself, you probably already know what are the habits and lifestyle choices you’re making that are harming you (if not now, in the future).

I’m one of the most impatient people there are, but, I have something clear: healing from the inside out might take longer, but will reap longer benefits than the quick fix you can achieve with a pill.

That’s it for today!

Thank you for reading my ramblings, and let me know, what’s your opinion of modern medicine? Are you also frustrated by some aspects of it? Or you just love a good use of pharmaceutical achievements to get rid of the pain?

Don’t be shy, let me know on the comments or send me a response!

Any how, have a great week and till the next issue of MindfulMess.

With MindfulMessy love,
Cris. 💌

Ps. I hope if anyone here is in the medical profession that you understand my frustration and don’t think I’m attacking you personally, this is just what I’ve experienced and how I’ve healed myself. 🙌

Ps. 2. Update on my skin, we’re 90 percent there, dealing with just the scars now! Whoop Whoop! What truly made the trick was just sleeping more and training less hard. 😀 Guess my hormones were just affected by my physical stress. 🙃