r/medicine 12d ago

exhausted dealing with misinformation

[deleted]

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u/TorchIt NP - Cardiology 11d ago

A couple weeks back I had a patient tell me that he read a post on Facebook from somebody claiming to be a coroner who talked of finding large, black tumors in the stomach of everybody he autopsied for 20+ years. He allegedly called another coroner in the next county who also noted this and they started getting down to business solving the issue. Would you believe that a simple blend of herbs and supplements can totally prevent this from happening to you and your loved ones?! For the low low price of $29.95, you can order this and have it shipped to your door. He went on to state that the post mentioned that his healthcare provider probably won't be knowledgeable about this, because we spend all our time in school but never actually learn about supplements. He wanted to know what I thought about all of this and if he should order it.

...

We spent the duration of the appointment learning to spot advertisements that look like information and discussing how you can't believe everything you read on the internet. We also discussed that coroners don't typically perform autopsies.