# Medical Advice **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [November 13, 2001, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126 "2001-11-13T15:51:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![daffodil](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@daffodil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/daffodil)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2001, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/61 "2001-11-17T20:15:29Z")
Oy oy oy! A biker type! I’m dead. _lol_ Colibri. Green Bean; Am I willfully obtuse? Errrrr… Yes? You guys should lighten up a bit. This is not the real world. I can’t sue anyone just because I got the advice on \*internet \* to get bunny-droppings for my skin. - _obtuse smile_ 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2001, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/62 "2001-11-17T20:57:39Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by daffodil \* > You guys should lighten up a bit. This is not the real world. I can’t sue anyone just because I got the advice on _internet_ to get bunny-droppings for my skin. Those statements alone demonstrate clearly that you are _not_ from the United Utates. Winning a suit might be hard, but suing is **easy**. Oneervol, but easy. QtM ---
**Author:** ![daffodil](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@daffodil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/daffodil)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2001, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/63 "2001-11-17T21:37:45Z")
Qadgop the Mercotan; \*LMAO \* You’re right, ofcourse. 🙂 I still think you all should lighten up a bit. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2001, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/64 "2001-11-17T22:50:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by daffodil \* > I still think you all should lighten up a bit. I once thought as you do. Just wait until your own ox is gored. Then you shall be hoisted upon your own petard. Cryptic little stinker, ain’t I? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![JillGat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9fc29f/32.png) [@JillGat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JillGat)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2001, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/65 "2001-11-17T23:12:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Qadgop the Mercotan \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > \*Originally posted by daffodil \* > > I still think you all should lighten up a bit. > > I once thought as you do. Just wait until your own ox is gored. Then you shall be hoisted upon your own petard. > > Cryptic little stinker, ain’t I? 😃 \*\* Jeez, you sound just like Collounsbury, with the petards and such. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2001, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/66 "2001-11-17T23:20:28Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by JillGat \* > Jeez, you sound just like Collounsbury, with the petards and such. 'cept I’ve made cheese, and my aunt still works at the cheese factory! ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2001, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/67 "2001-11-18T03:24:27Z")
Yeah, but, Daffodil, the problem is two-fold. First, there really are people out there who are box-of-rocks dumb enough to follow all kinds of seemingly outer-space-alien gonzo advice. Consider the fact of business enterprises such as Miss Cleo and Alex Chiu, neither of whom seems to be hurting for money. Second, that your estate can sue the Straight Dope Message Board, as well as the Chicago _Reader_, Cecil Adams, and as many moderators and administrators as the lawyers feel would be profitable, if someone here on the SDMB gave you advice to use rabbit droppings for your skin, and it turned out you had a malignant skin melanoma, and that all the rabbit-dropping treatment did was keep you from going to a doctor. “The Straight Dope is that these black moles will go away if I rub rabbit droppings into them…” It wouldn’t matter whether the poster who gave the rabbit-dropping advice was speaking in jest, or whether he was serious, and it wouldn’t matter how loudly the SDMB’s lawyers protested to the jury, “What reasonable person could possibly think that rabbit droppings could help a skin condition?” All that would matter would be that the advice came from a website purporting to “Fight Ignorance” and to answer General Questions, and when the advice was followed, it ended badly. ---
**Author:** ![Atreyu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@Atreyu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atreyu)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2001, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/68 "2001-11-18T04:09:26Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by handy \* > **Montfort you are wrong! Deafness does not mean you can’t hear, I CAN hear; but I’m deaf too, figure it out** Since **handy** doesn’t seem inclined to explain further, but is instead content to say “figure it out”, I’ll step in for a moment here. What **handy** is trying to say here is that there is more than one meaning to the word deaf. However, that meaning is often indicated by how the word is capitalized. If a person wrote that they were Deaf, then that person would be indicating that are part of the Deaf Culture, which has American Sign Language as its foundation. The uncapitalized form of the word is now used to refer to the audiological meaning of deafness, where the person has a severe to profound hearing loss. Many Deaf people are deaf, but not all deaf people are Deaf. Personally, I’m severely to profoundly deaf, but I’m not Deaf. I use hearing aids and am dependent on lip-reading for optimal understanding of others’ speech, but I know very little sign language. I hope to become adept at ASL someday, though. This [link](http://www.nad.org/infocenter/infotogo/dcc/difference.html) to a page on the National Association of the Deaf’s website probably has the single best discussion of the different meanings behind these terms. Contrary to popular belief, true audiological deafness is actually fairly rare. Most deaf (and Deaf) individuals, even those who use sign language, have some degree of residual hearing. However, not all of them are able to utilize their residual hearing enough to clearly understand spoken language, even with the most powerful hearing aids. I’m a very good example of this. My left ear, which has a severe hearing loss, demonstrates word recognition of about 90% under controlled test conditions (i.e., an audiological assessment of speech understanding). My right ear, which has a profound hearing loss with thresholds only 15 to 20 dB poorer than my left, demonstrates word recognition of exactly **zero** percent. No matter how loud the speech signal, I will perceive it only as garbled noise. ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2001, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/69 "2001-11-18T04:12:50Z")
Ya know, if y’all keep making such a deal of this, we can simply shut down all threads that ask about anything more than a hangnail. We’d prefer not to do that . . . to let common sense rule. Once again, for the benefit of those that might not have gotten it the first hundred times we said it: \*\*Nothing you read on this board should ever take the place of competent real life seen-'em-in-person medical advice. We can tell you about what we’ve seen, but we haven’t seen you. And mostly WANAD. (Or any other kind of medical professional, whatever that means to you. And those that are real life medical professionals aren’t going to be serving you on this board.)\*\* your humble TubaDiva Administrator ---
**Author:** ![thinksnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thinksnow/32/2849_2.png) [@thinksnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thinksnow)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2001, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/70 "2001-11-19T21:09:40Z")
So the long and the short of it is: if you’re going to ignore the actual OP and throw out conjecture, even prefaced with “an exclamation of wonder, approval, etc.\*,” do not attempt to indicate a specific medical practice or diagnosis. This is especially true for non-practitioners. If I may provide, IMHO, a good example of this: I had **[sleep apnea](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=84541)**. My father had it and I had evidence/witness accounts that I suffered from the same ailment. I mentioned it to my GP and asked if I could see an E.N.T (Ear, Nose & Throat) specialist to seek confirmation. I knew I had it, but the proper thing to do was to go through the channels. I was officially diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea. The recommended treatment was a CPAP machine. From the outset, I had been hoping that this might be enough to warrant getting my tonsils removed. In and of itself, it is not. _However_, I regularly got strep throat and my tonsils were of differing size and that, in combination with the OSA, **[was enough](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=87849)**. My point to posting all this is this: if I had said “I think I have sleep apnea” and someone had replied with “Boy, you should get your tonsils (and adenoids and uvula) removed (and have the skin on the back of your throat tightened up)” or “Boy, you should go get a CPAP machine” it would have been ridiculous advice. By your arguments, though, **handy** , it would be alright because that is exactly what I had done (eventually) and it was sanctioned by a slew of people practicing medicine. Those are both specific remedies and each has strict guidelines both for their recommendation and for their implementation (the psi/inches mercury pressure of the CPAP has to be specifically set to your breathing, and not everyone needs to have their adenoids and/or uvula removed.) I consider myself quite well educated in the (specific) area of sleep apnea, yet my sole advice to anyone asking if it sounds like they have it is _and will continue to be_: see your doctor and/or seek a specialist (i.e., a sleep study.) I would do this IRL, too, and not just online because IANAD, plain and simple. At the risk of using even more of my sig in a regular post, your post are dangerous because they are specious, **handy** , despite any similarity to an actual medical diagnosis. [sub]\*: “boy” according to Random House, _Webster’s College Dictionary_, 1990[/sub] ---
**Author:** ![Booker57](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Booker57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Booker57)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2001, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/71 "2001-11-21T14:35:25Z")
With so many people calling you Mr. I thought you needed a shingle 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Esprix](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/esprix/32/7899_2.png) [@Esprix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Esprix)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2001, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/72 "2001-11-21T19:55:46Z")
> [@](#): > > _Originally posted by **handy** _ > > Try to remember that deafness is a communication impairment… Ah, see, I didn’t know this. Just because you have by far the highest post count doesn’t mean everyone here knows everything about you. > [@](#): > > My primary receiving language is sign language which has a grammar structure that leaves out a lot of words–words I often forget to add myself to my writings. I sign a little ASL myself, and dated a deaf guy and an ASL interpreter at one point. Esprix ---
**Author:** ![reprise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ea666f/32.png) [@reprise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/reprise)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2001, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126/73 "2001-11-21T20:11:07Z")
I just want to know when **Manny** moved to Holland. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-advice/93126.md?page=3)