Thanks for all your informative posts, and the positive way in which you send them. I really appreciate them, as do others.

We chose not to vaccinate our son with ANYthing when he was born almost four years ago. You would have thought I was telling our doctor we were not going to feed him. Her reaction, and response everytime I have gone in since them, lead me to believe that doctors are merely trained dispensers, it's all about diagnosing something for which a script can be given. And why not? In the first year of a baby's life, under the CDC schedule, they will go for vaccines at least four times. For parents choosing not to vaccinate, we only go to the doc when the baby is sick, which for us that first year was, thankfully, never! We know of at least one family who, in their search for a pediatrician, were told that if they were not willing to follow the vaccination schedule, they could find a doctor elsewhere! What kind of doctors are the medical schools pumping out?

But back to your point, and that of several threads here. How is a doc going to keep up that affluent doctor lifestyle many are led to believe they "deserve" for going into medicine if he doesn't go with the establishment flow? When I finally went for my son's check-up this year because I was feeling particularly guilty, the doc's first comment was-we haven't seen you in two years-you have missed several rounds of shots! AAAHHH! I just told her our son wasn't sick, so no need to come in! Isn't that the way it was when we were all growing up? We only went in if something were actually broken, like a leg! I always have to remind her that we are "those parents" who are not vaccinating their son. She will start in with her vaccine bandwagon song, but when I remind her my husband has PD, it shuts her up. Perhaps because I once asked her to personally guarantee that IF we were to follow her advice and vaccinate our son, he would never get PD or any other neurological condtion. Guess what she chose?

Regardless of one's health situation, I think the majority of today's doctors are of questionable value. They do not understand, among others, the crucial importance of nutrition or the role of stress because these are not part of their education (we actually had one neuro at a top facility tell my husband NOT to take any vitamins, even while acknowledging that PD meds can strip certain ones from the body! Why is this not deemed imcompetent?). Even at my own last "annual" (another relatively recent development in the medical profession, getting us to come in every year) the doc wanted to give me a script for Zoloft when I mentioned I was stressed and not sleeping, which I refused. No doubt a nasty note was written in my file for my audacity in refusing the drug. Nothing was said about alternative, healthier ways to manage that stress. They even had the gall to call my home after I had refused the script at the office, and leave a message on our answering machine inquiring where to send the script so I could get it filled!

I could go on, but most here are all too familiar with the woes of the mainstream medical profession and its relatives. But the good news is I do think it is changing, because people, ill or not, are sick (no pun intended there) of the system, and the system doesn't work! People, PD or not, are retaliating by taking charge of our own health, as opposed to the idea of "managed care" and turning to alternative medicines, supplements, and lifestyle change. There are a few books I have read recently relating to all of this which might be of interest to some here (sorry I don't have the authors):

How Doctors Think (great book about how doctors are trained to think in a linear fashion which results in a diagnosis which, conveniently, results in a script...BTW, at the end are several excellent questions for patients to ask doctors to help get them thinking "out of the box")...oh, if I remember correctly, this book also has an excellent section on the pressure doctors receive from Big Pharma (I remember getting really mad when I read this section so be forewarned!)

Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers (loaned to us by our daughter's school counselor who knows of our situation, a fascinating book on stress and the many ways the body responds to it)

Hope these are of interest!