Car mechanics and medicine:

“Every time you go to the dealership for an oil change, it seems, the car ends up needing some other service as well.” . . .

. . . Suddenly, I could envision a scene in which the roles were reversed. A 50-year-old mechanic comes to see his family physician. Active and apparently fit, this patient rarely visits the office, but, on this day, he’d like an antibiotic for a “terrible head cold.”

After doing a history and physical, the FP diagnoses the patient with a viral upper respiratory infection and prescribes a conservative therapy. But it’s been years since the patient has had a complete routine health-maintenance exam, so the FP instructs him to make an appointment for one. He also hands his patient a lab slip to check routine fasting labs a week prior to the visit, along with instructions to obtain ambulatory BP measurements””to confirm an initial diagnosis of hypertension.

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