Saturday, September 12, 2009

What Are The Chances?

I was told a story about a person who was watching House and saw a case where a patient had heart palpitations when anyone put pressure on his abdomen. The patient on House had a pheochromocytoma.

This person went into her doctor's office and claimed that she too had a pheochromocytoma and described her symptoms and how they were similar to the case she saw on House.

I'm guessing 99% of the time when a patient presents at their doctor's office with a diagnosis they came too while watching a fictional tv show...they are wrong. This is even more likely when the diagnosis is as incredibly rare as a pheochromocytoma. There are endocrinologists who go their entire career without seeing a SINGLE case of pheochromocytoma.

Turns out this woman was right and she did have this incredibly rare disease. Seriously, what are the chances?

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