Remember my recent posting about Dr. David Katz’s article on how doctors need to learn how to deal with their obese patients better? Well here’s a doctor that maybe could use a little face time with Dr. Katz.
Video Courtesy of KSL.com
Dr. Binkley of Salt Lake City recently posted the following to her twitter account:
A 5’2″ woman weighing 254 pounds today told me she eats ‘hardly anything’. I guess that might be true if ‘anything’ means the whole cow.
Yea.
And later asked about it, she played it as trying to get a point across with the use of some humor.
I went and checked out her Twitter stream… she has been very unapologetic, and she has just as many supporters as she does detractors in this. Some are even yelling about free speech – which I agree she can say what she wants, but that doesn’t preclude her from taking responsibility for the resulting storm that hits from it. Which to her credit, I suppose she’s not ducking this or anything.
If you know me at all, I’m not about being all “politically correct” or any of that nonsense… and I love a good bit of humor… and I’m sure not immune from making the occasional comment that either didn’t come across the way I first envisioned or intended. So I’m more than willing to cut the doctor some slack.
But just like there’s a difference between having the occasional treat and over-indulging… there’s a difference between getting your point across with a bit of humor and just being insensitive.
Here’s a couple other recent Tweets by her, and my replies back to her…
healthewoman Do No Harm does not mean Look the Other Way when people are hurting themselves.
mcnee @healthewoman There is a difference between being honest with a patient and broadcasting it over the internet…
mcnee @healthewoman laughing at yourself is harder when so many are already ridiculing you.
She hasn’t been online since I sent those, so I haven’t seen any sort of response yet. We’ll see if I even get one. I was tempted not to link to her Twitter account. It is sure to be easy enough to find for those interested, but on the other hand… shunning these topics, ignoring them and those who feel this way won’t change anything any more so than attacking them.
Instead, there is an opportunity here to further educate, to further inform. Yea, there will be the usual “brick walls”, but hopefully if we continue to chip away, eventually they will fall.
Thank you for calling her out on her insensitivity! I am interested to see if you get a response.
I never did, though she has had some on going conversation with a few others…
The “it was a joke” and “some people have no sense of humor” responses are a cop-out. If it was a “joke” it was a pretty lame one and not remotely funny. Plus, as a doctor, (a) she shouldn’t be talking about her patients on Twitter and (b) she should not blame everything that’s wrong with her patients on their weight. For all she knows, this patient has some sort of endocrine disease.