Do you know the difference between diagnosis and duty to warn?

[msc545]

This is for all the people on here that have written to me, complaining that what I have written somehow violated the Goldwater Rule. It didn't.


Writing in an opinion piece for The BMJ, two experts suggested that while doctors should not have free rein to proclaim their own perceived medical diagnoses of the president or other public figures, physicians can still sound an alarm by calling for clinical assessment.
https://www.medpagetoday.com/washington-watch/washington-watch/120947?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

Updates

2 mo

The latest MedPage Today article of the above title finally makes the distinction unequivocal, and the public is beginning to recognize the profound harm that resulted from the confusion. More and more people see the difference—even if the concepts are somewhat complex.

[ProbablyClueless]

This is a situation where I think over clarification is a good idea.


If the idea you are trying to convey is that you think a political figure needs to receive a psychiatric evaluation, that’s really something that ought to be explicitly stated. It takes two seconds to write the additional words out, and it eliminates confusion.

[msc545]

No, what I was trying to say was that citing the Goldwater Rule is a very common response to people in my profession expressing opinions regarding the behavior of a public figure. It is one thing to offer a diagnosis, which we don't normally do; it is quite another thing to say that we think this is a dangerous person, which we often do. There is at least an argument that we have a civic, if not professional, duty to tell everyone else when we think someone is a danger to them.

[ProbablyClueless]

Gotcha, gotcha... Do you think that that duty extends to making sure that laypeople can understand the distinctions in the warnings you're trying to give them?

[msc545]

Yes, I think that the duty extends to making sure that what we say is very clear and not misunderstood or misinterpreted by lay people. That is not an easy thing to do, since lay people often think that they know what we are talking about when they actually do not. In support of that, I would point you to the common use of some psychiatric language by lay people in contexts where it actually is not appropriate, e. g., "bipolar" and "OCD", Which are actually diagnostic terms that are commonly used by lay people in ways that make absolutely no sense, that is in no technical sense whatsoever.

[ProbablyClueless]

Thanks for MHO!

[Anonymous]

"Warning" people about someone else's diagnosis you have no right to make is a form a slander, which is illegal. It is not covered by free speech.

[RandomGirl42]

No, I don't know the difference between diagnosis and duty to warn but I do know that I got an auto-invite which I always feel obligated to reply to for some reason and then I noticed it said, Be the first girl to share an opinion
and earn 3 more Xper points! So I did! 😊

[RandomGirl42]

Ty for the MHO 😊