Emailing Your Doctor - Great, right?

 

You have to love those Group Health commercials touting how great it is that a patient can actually email their doctor. Traditionally, the information contained in a patients medical record was dictated by the doctor into their record as the result of a face to face consultation, or sometimes from a phone note if you called in. The information that made it into a medical record as a result of a consultation, for the most part, is usually factually correct and a true representation of what the patient told the doctor.

However, email is a different animal. How many times have you either sent, or been the recipient of an email that was interpreted differently than what the sender intended? In conversations, there is tone and inflection that allow the recipient to clearly understand your mood etc. Are you conveying that you're upset, angry, happy, sad or maybe you're throwing in a bit of sarcasm. Without tone and inflection, it's up to the recipient to fill in the missing blanks, and often they get it wrong. And then you end up attempting to explain that their interpretation isn't what you meant and that they took it completely wrong.

Now lets take those emails (or letters and diaries for that matter) that you sent into your doctor and they are now in the hands of an insurance defense lawyer because you were in an auto accident or otherwise injured due to the fault of another person. Do you think that the defense lawyer can interpret your email to suit his or her purpose? You bet they can. And then you are put in a position where it appears you are either contradicting what you wrote or trying to explain what that email really meant.

I am sure that the ability to email your doctor can be valuable, but be cautious and understand the pitfalls that can occur with that type of communication. Also, remember that this applies to not only email, but any type of written correspondence, even a diary you may keep regarding your injuries.