I'm very lucky to live a life where I get paid to do what I love, helping patients in my practice and around the world here on ...

the-most-offensive-question-im-asked-as-a-doctor-dr-mike

The Most Offensive Question I’m Asked As A Doctor | Dr. Mike

the most degrading offensive assumption-filled question that i get asked way too often mostly on social media but perhaps maybe even in real life is i live a very weird life i've spent over 10 years studying to become a doctor and when i finally became one i split my time between the hospital and social media and media so there's not many doctors out there like me and i want to share with you what it's like being a doctor youtuber media personality what does that all mean what challenges do i face and most importantly answer some of your most frequently asked questions [Music] i am a real doctor i mean i get that asked all the time it would happen a lot more when i was in residency training but now still when i tell people what i do like but are you a real doctor i'm a true family medicine physician board certified i keep up with my licenses both in new york and new jersey even though i do most of my practicing in new jersey i work half the week in an outpatient family medicine center i actually have done a full day in my life video that's linked down below and i'm actually in the process of shooting another day in my life in the coming weeks i'm really excited to share that with you for those of you who don't know being a family medicine doctor means i treat patients of all ages for all types of conditions and why i love the field of family medicine to be in the media spotlight is because we have to be able to talk on all different types of subjects we have to digest information from specialists complex information from specialists really quickly and make it easily understandable for my patients i also have to predict what questions my patients have often times that intersect with the questions that you have so i think the more i practice in being a doctor in real life the better i become on youtube but at the same time the more time i spend researching different subjects for youtube the more value i bring to my patients it's like one hand truly does feed the other [Music] people will see me getting out of my car and say oh you're dr mike hey dr mike i have this thing do you think i need to go get it checked out not only is that unethical that they're doing that because you can't really make a good diagnosis in that uh setting but it's also kind of like an invasion of privacy that i never expected to face when we're in med school we're actually trained to deal with something known as cocktail medicine and cocktail medicine is when you're at a bar with a friend and they say hey you're a doctor let me pick your mind about something you have to be very clear and specific that you're not establishing a doctor-patient relationship because when you do that you're actually becoming liable for the results that they experience in taking your advice so you learn how to straddle this line of explaining that you're speaking in generalities you're not giving direct advice and i've gotten better over time in doing this that's why i was able to launch my curbside consult series where i literally run around the streets of new york city answering people's questions and i've leaned into this uncomfortable uncertain situation and the more that i've done that the better i've become and the less stress it's taken off of my shoulders [Music] now this is very very difficult but also really important to the integrity of me as a physician unlike most influencers or most celebrities when they give advice they're giving advice personally but i'm giving advice not only personally but as an expert so i need to understand that the weight of my message is higher than that of a traditional influencer and i need to put that extra level of integrity on top of it so you'll never see me advertise something that i truly do not believe in or that evidence-based science doesn't stand behind as well being financially successful is great but i'm never going to do that at the expense of my patients or you my viewers [Music] my relationship with my patients has absolutely changed since i became popular but it's changed for the better these are hypothetical based on true examples patient a is a 26 year old female that has never went for a preventive health checkup that has now come in and gotten her first pap smear with a family medicine doctor because she felt comfortable after watching a few of my videos guess what we found an irregularity on that pap smear we're able to act upon that and prevent a case a potential future case of cancer second example i have patients who are looking to lose weight and they want to do it in a healthy way they want to see what options they have sometimes we run out of time in a visit and they say doctor do you have more resources for me to look at i trust your opinion well now i can direct them to videos on my channel they can watch those videos pick up little tidbits and on the next visit they can bring me their list of questions so that i can answer them and they can make the best decision for what works for them and the third example when a patient doesn't know they're going to see me i walk into the room and they freak out because they're like oh my god i was just watching one of your covet 19 videos or i was watching one of your grey's anatomy reviews and now you're my actual doctor and they're just so much more dialed in on that visit they're excited they want to take control of their health i mean that is what every doctor wants from their patients for them to be get excited about health literacy to learn about what medications they're taking what preventive things they should be doing to improve their health and when someone watches that on my channel and then sees me in the office that motivation goes through the roof that's one of those things that brings me so much joy because it oftentimes happens in the pediatric population so when i see a 10 year old who's struggling or a 13 year old who's struggling in school getting bullied perhaps and they feel comfortable talking to me about their mental health struggles or what's going on at home i consider that a major major win [Music] when it comes to being someone who has a lot of followers there's going to be things that we all share in common with that unique group of people like i even talked about it with emma chamberlain on the channel that interview is linked down below people recognize you they make assumptions about you they think they know you simply because they saw you on the youtube channel when it comes to being a popular person i think for me one of the things that people talk about most often is the loss of privacy that's absolutely true people are really involved in your personal life whether it's digging through your relationships your past relationships what's going on in your family life sometimes that gets quite weird especially when emails start getting sent around to you know friends relatives i mean the amount of fake accounts on social media using my face or my name is incredible please do not fall for it look for the blue verified check mark all my accounts are verified the sad part about it is they oftentimes cheat people out of money by pretending to be me getting them to send pictures share intimate things about their life even getting financial benefits from doing so another thing that happens is negative comments trolls uh death threats i choose not to focus or dwell on it so much i also think that i'm lucky there's a lot of positivity on the channel thanks to you i think i approach a lot of these very difficult issues with empathy it doesn't trigger as many people to come after me in a hateful type of way i hope to continue this moving forward in the future where we have more fruitful discussions less hate less trolls but at the end of the day we just have to expect for that to happen take it on the chin and move on because as jonathan heights said on this channel we have to become okay with being treated unfairly or poorly i'm probably mincing words but it's something similar to that and i very much agree with it and being someone who was picked on a lot growing up i think i've learned how to handle that well and use it in a positive way to motivate me to help me improve because ultimately that's what we all need to do if we want to get further in life [Music] i studied over 10 years to get here i did it because i love it i'm passionate about it nothing will ever replace the joy that i feel in being in a room with a patient helping them being one on one being in that moment the most degrading offensive assumption-filled question that i get asked way too often mostly on social media why did you become a doctor when you could have been a model as if those two careers are interchangeable when you ask that question you're almost making the assumption in saying you can't be a doctor who's also good looking or you can't also be a model and be smart at the same time i actually just got a few dms the other day from female doctors who were saying that they're struggling with that same thing the issue that people aren't taking them seriously because they are beautiful why judging someone based on their looks is useless in fact i pride myself on proving people wrong in that in high school i was the president of the math and science institute it was one of like the most highly regarded uh types of classes that we had in our school because that i had to go to the principal's office for a meeting every three months when i'm sitting in the principal's office i was dressed kind of gangster because that's how i like to dress baggy clothes jeans like falling off of my hips that was a style back then i was really into it principal walks into the room and says uh what are you here for detention i was like no i'm actually here for the math and science institute principal's bi-monthly meeting i'm actually the president as well the look on her face gave me goosebumps i love that feeling and i encourage those who are facing discrimination for looking a specific way to try and use that to energize them or better yet something that i've learned over time to do just prove people wrong with your results put blinders on get to where you need to be if someone is being discriminatory because of the way you look that's a whole other issue and you actually you should absolutely address that but if someone says oh you know you're too beautiful to do this brush that ish off move on and crush with your knowledge and experience check out this hilarious tiktok video or my recent memes video that you may have missed and as always stay happy and healthy [Music]

Dr.

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