Have you heard of “iatrogenesis”? I hadn’t encountered this word until recently, when I heard it uttered by Professor Constantin Dulcan in a talkshow. Iatrogenesis is considered the third leading cause of death after cardiovascular disease and cancer. According to Wikipedia “Iatrogenesis (ancient Greek: iatrogen – produced by a doctor) is a pathological state of intoxication, produced or aggravated by the use of a drug in too high doses or for too long. This condition can also occur psychogenically, being caused by the doctor, the treatment applied or the conditions of hospitalization “. Adverse effects of medications recommended by the doctor (including ignorance of any allergies or interactions between different medications the patient is taking), resistance of viruses and bacteria to antibiotics, nosocomial infections, misdiagnosis (including diagnoses of mental illness), unnecessary surgery, pulmonary embolism, anesthetic complications and heart attacks after surgery, improper hospital conditions.
Iatrogenesis is as old as medicine, it must be accepted as such. It is not just about mistakes of ignorance or negligence, but also about the inherent risk of a medical act. For example, chemotherapy and radiation therapy to treat cancer. Or a complicated surgery needed to save a life. Although it is considered a leading cause of mortality and morbidity, paradoxically, iatrogenicity does not appear as such in the WHO classifications of disease causes (the manifestation being reported and codified, without mentioning the etiology). Often, the iatrogenic origin of a manifestation is ignored and confused with the symptoms of the underlying disease.
Many of us have probably encountered iatrogenicity. I know it has happened to me many times. From the doctor who yelled at me in my youth that I didn’t catch too fast how to administer the 10 drugs he had prescribed me (there was no google then), to the doctor who wanted to cut my breasts only by looking at a mammogram, to another doctor who gave me antibiotics for 4 years, to the doctor who removed my gallbladder, to the one who confused my left ovary with the right one and cut my abdomen from one hip to the other and then he was outraged that I accused him that I had a nosocomial infection after which I took those antibiotics for 4 years, from the bugs in the hospital ward that fell from the ceiling into the bed, to the doctors who tell me that I take too few medicines for my ailments … Now I know that this is called iatrogenic and is the third leading cause of unofficial mortality after cardiovascular disease and cancer.