How Patients Are Deceived

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When I came across the Medscape article by Dr. William G. Wilkoff, “Rumpelstiltskin and a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy,” I felt deeply unsettled, not because the content was unfamiliar, but because it echoes my own experience so closely.
In the article, Wilkoff describes how assigning a diagnosis, simply naming a patient's suffering, can have a calming, even therapeutic effect. A label, he explains, helps quiet the anxiety of the unknown. It gives shape to chaos.

But what happens when the label is wrong?

I’ve lived through that question. Like many patients navigating persistent, unexplained symptoms, I pushed for more, more tests, more answers, more clarity. But when I questioned the initial diagnosis, asked for confirmation or further investigation, the tone in the room shifted. I was no longer “the patient.” I became the skeptic. The problem. A troublemaker.

And I’m not alone. So many others in chronic pain or ongoing illness end up clinging to the diagnosis they were given, not because it fits, but because it gives them something to hold on to. It becomes their permission slip to step away from social obligations, a shield against judgment. The diagnosis becomes a kind of ID card: I’m not lazy. I’m not imagining things. I’m sick.

But then comes the specialist, the second opinion, the tests, the follow-up. And when that narrow diagnosis fails under scrutiny, the patient is left with nothing but doubt and a silent question: Was it ever real?

Worse still, many patients aren’t left with no diagnosis; they’re given a new one: psychogenic. A polite medical term for “it’s all in your head.”

The effect is devastating. Physical pain and suffering are rebranded as mental instability. The original symptoms remain, but now the patient has a new burden: the suspicion that they’re imagining it all. It's medical gaslighting, neatly packaged in professionalism and credentials.

This isn’t a one-off story. It’s a pattern. A system-wide failure rooted in outdated clinical routines and a reluctance among too many primary care physicians to stay current with emerging medical research. Some doctors continue to rely on shortcuts, familiar diagnoses that are convenient, comfortable, and, most importantly, unquestioned.

So how many have suffered because of this? How many voices have been silent, how many symptoms ignored, how many lives derailed? All because someone in a white coat stopped looking for answers once they had a label to offer.

The damage is real, not just physical, but emotional and social. Misdiagnosis can feel like closure, but it is a deception. Without investigation, without evidence, without true curiosity, it’s not medicine. It’s a mask. And for far too many of us, it’s a deception that we’re left to live with.

© 2025-2030 Sieglinde W. Alexander. All writings by Sieglinde W. Alexander have a fife year copy right. Library of Congress Card Number: LCN 00-192742 ISBN: 0-9703195-0-9

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