u/Allisnotwellin

Recently had a difficult patient encounter and got absolutely eviscerated by the patient on their review. " poor listener" " lacked any care or empathy" etc. etc.

It was a middle age female patient with chronic, 15 plus years of back pain, ordered MRI which showed minimal findings and with a known diagnosis of Fibromyalgia.

I reviewed all recent imaging and discussed that her pain is most likely related to fibromyalgia vs any localized spinal pathology. And then discussed the recommended treatment for fibromyalgia. She essentially dismissed and refused any medications as she had "tried them all". She also refused recommendation for physical therapy. At a certain point in the discussion I really had nothing else to offer. She left frustrated and hence the review.

Any poor review prompts a discussion with our department head.

Over the past year or so the only real complaints I ever get patient wise are from people I simply cannot help and have nothing to offer.

I am a newer attending (2 years) and always looking for ways to improve patient experience. Usually poor reviews don't really get to me but idk this one was really frustrating.

Any tips or recommendations for how to navigate these encounters?

Making friends as adults is hard enough. My wife and I have 4 kids and are in the stage where most of our interactions with other adults is with the parents of our kids friends/ teammates, and most of those interactions are superficial.

Recently we were invited over for dinner to a lovely family who are in similar stage of life, are extremely kind and giving.. salt of the earth type. I can see our kids growing up with their kids. And I connect with the him and and my wife with her(this doesn't happen often, it's usually more one sided)

In our conversation we found out they decided not to vaccinate their youngest child. I didn't push and the subject changed and didn't really come up again. They also homeschool their kids which we also did for a time but ran into to some pretty weird families in this population, with similar anti-vax beliefs. Besides that there weren't really any other yellow/red flags. Neither of them are in medicine.

l'm wondering if issues like these have ever influenced how your relationships developed over time?

am I overthinking this?