No excuse for lying about health status

Immediately after the news broke out that three doctors died due to COVID-19, people took to Twitter to air their frustrations and were quick to blame patients for their failure to divulge accurate health and travel history. To many, this alleged “lie” caused the life of an unsung hero who was at the frontline battling the pandemic.

A patient withholding facts and misleading health workers is no laughing matter. Physicians cannot appropriately diagnose and treat patients unless the latter share information freely. Thus the feelings of anger, hatred, and frustration felt by many doctors were all valid. These feelings make them human, after all. But, this is more than a simple case of dishonesty. To directly equate a person’s death to a lie, whether intentional or not, is a bit overstretched. Alternatively, our frustration directs us to question what could have possibly gone wrong between the patient-physician relationship.

Much like the rest of us in the field of health care, patients also fear for their lives. Some patients are intimidated; it is sometimes difficult to share private information with our friends and families. What more to people you barely know, like health workers? Unfortunately, this is not an excuse for patients to deliberately lie about their health status.

Although motivations for withholding the truth vary from patient to patient, options to address this problem are rooted in one concept: a collaborative patient-health worker relationship. It is important for our patients to feel that we trust them and that they, too, can trust us. Let us allow our patients to freely verbalize their thoughts and feelings. Let us take time to listen to them, so that they can put their trust in us.

REINER LORENZO J. TAMAYO, RN
Philippine General Hospital
renztamayo@gmail.com