The Hypochondriac's Guide to Life. and Death. Read Free Page A

lumps. Finding none, check for nodes or lesions or garfunkels. Finding none, get a brain scan. Finding no abnormalities, you contrive to have a conversation with a trusted friend wherein you casually mention that you know of a person who noticed a slight pain in his armpit when he lifted his arm a certain way, and your friend says yes, she once knew someone like that who later developed dysentery and pooped himself to death, and suddenly you have to go to the bathroom real bad.
Do you have any moles?
I don’t know.
Yes. Maybe I should get them looked at.
Yes, but they have not changed appreciably in the last 18 months. I have Polaroids.
Systemic lupus erythematosus is a serious, debilitating, potentially fatal autoimmune disease involving periodic, episodic occurrences of some or all of the following symptoms: fatigue, muscle aches, rashes, nausea, dry mouth, chest pain, headaches, bruising of the skin, tenderness in the joints, forgetfulness. Do you think you might have systemic lupus erythematosus?
Nah.
Why? What have you heard?
If it were only that simple.
Would you marry a proctologist?
No.
No, unless I loved the person very, very much.
No, unless I had polyps.
How do you think you will die?
In bed, surrounded by weeping children and grandchildren.
Flying through the windshield of your car.
Flying through the windshield of your car after suffering a “cerebrovascular accident,” or stroke, probably linked to undiagnosed atherosclerosis, thrombotic endocarditis, or hemorrhagic telangiectasia.
GRADING
    Score of 9-10: You should buy this hook because you are entirely too cavalier about your body. Vigilance is critical to good health.
    Score of 11-19: You should buy this book to feel superior to the people in the next group. A positive mental attitude is critical to good health.
    Score of 20-27: You are a hypochondriac. If you do not buy this book, you will die.
    Score of 28 or higher: You are an imbecile. You have already bought this book and plan to use it as your family’s primary medical text.
    There are other excellent books available to those persons concerned with their health. In the interests of fairness and full disclosure, I will briefly describe these volumes and list their principal advantages and disadvantages.
    The first group consists of books with names like
The Family Medical Guide,
or
The Home Medical Encyclopedia,
or
The Doctors’ Guide to Good Health,
generally published by the American Medical Association or other renowned physicians’ organizations. These are helpful, responsible diagnostic books, featuring listings of symptoms in easy-to-follow flow charts, each chart terminating in a row of exclamation points urging you to see your physician without delay.
    The second group are clinical texts, intended for doctors andavailable mostly in medical bookstores and libraries, containing lines like this, from page 458 of
Current Medical Diagnosis and Treatment, 1995:
“Disorders such as disseminated intravascular coagulation, thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura, hemolyticuremic syndrome, hypersplenism, and sepsis are easily excluded by the absence of system illness. Thus, patients with isolated thrombocytopenia with no other abnormal findings almost certainly have immune thrombocytopenia.”
    These books are characterized by the use of humongously scientific Latin-influenced terms such as “sternutation” 1 and “epistaxis” 2 and “cutis anserina” 3 and “pyrexia” 4 and “diaphoresis” 5 and “singultus,” 6 which are too important and complicated to be understood by unschooled morons such as yourself.
    Many of these medical books also contain pages of photographs, such as this one, reprinted from
French’s Differential Diagnosis
(1979):

    So these books can be highly entertaining, though they cost much more than my book and make you vomit.
    The third type consists of books arranged on endless shelves labeled