Does my doctor have his own doctor? If so, can't I just ask his doctor who HIS doctor is and so on until I follow the chain to the world's ultimate doctor?

They did something like this on the tv to find out where does the Barber gets his haircut until they find the ultimate barber but they ended up in a closed loop.
Edit: typo

What if they are just each other's doctor?

Alright, Spongebob.

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Dad is a doc. He usually self diagnoses. He's a physician surgeon, dermatologist and General Practitioner. If it's ever a procedure or surgery or advanced diagnosis beyond the usual flu or cold (for himself), he gets blood tests done and he always has his buddies to operate on him if needed. Doctors have a LOT of friends in the medical industry. Very privileged existence. Afaik doctors will form networks and refer each other. So an Ent will know a neuro who'll know a psychiatrist who'll know a cardiac and on and on, and they also know loads of others like paramedics, pathology lab personnel, dentists and even trichologists and podiatrists and all. My dad has at least about 40-50 doctors from different specialities and super specialities listed in his contacts.

Can confirm, my dad's a doctor and he has a doctor. Doesn't ever go to the doctor though, he's too stubborn...

Trick question: We doctors (male especially) are the worst about going to doctors.

When i do go, i already know what i want from them. And really a main criteria in choice is being in a decent but SEPARATE health system from where i work. I do not need to be getting a colonoscopy from a bunch of people I'm going to see at work the next day.

We already know who the ultimate doctor is : Leonid Rogozov

suppose there's only 2 people in the world and they're both doctors

then they just act as each other's doctors so there's no ultimate doctor

conclude by induction there need not be such a thing as an ultimate doctor

It's turtles all the way down.

According to the wikipedia theory, once you reach the end of the chain, the world's ultimate doctor actually has a PhD in Philosophy.

Dr. Tom, who is your doctor? "Dr. Bob" Dr. Bob, who is your doctor? "Dr. Jon" Dr. Jon, who is your doctor? "Dr. Tom"

And what if at the end of the chain all you find is Dr Dre?

The calmest guy I know is in social services and basically a wingman for mentally ill people who are out of institutions and living in society. His job is to get them re-adjusted to society and basically keep them from doing anything that would hurt themselves or others. He's like a zen master, but I want to find out who his boss is and who his boss' boss is to meet the ultimate zen master.

WebMD

House.

PLOT TWIST: Your Doctor's Doctor uses your Doctor as their Doctor.

Is there a never-ending chain of mailmen delivering mail to other mailmen. I guess a P.O. box could in theory break the chain.

someone on some show asked this about the mailman too, if I recall.

Would make for a much more interesting reality show..

Naming it The Ultimate Doctor Challenge or The PhD Factor would be cool

Getting in the shower now, this will dominate my thoughts today lol

Yeah I'm pretty sure I heard this about finding the world's best barber years ago..

Assuming that your Doctor sees a better Doctor than him/herself could be a mistake.

SpongeBob has a similar theory involving mail

My dad is a doctor, but he owns the surgery so other surgeries know him. When he goes in, he just tells the other less experienced doctor what his problem is, what drug he wants, what dosage he wants, etc. They just go along with it

Considering the health of most doctors I know, I have no desire to use one of their physicians.

Is it a giant doctor loop? Nope. Chuck Testa.

Had to switch from a pediatrician to an adult doctor recently. My doc said he would be glad to recommend a few but I already had one in mind (I work in the hospital and have gotten to know quite a few docs). When I told him who I was thinking he said "well shit that's my doctor so I guess that's probably the best recommendation you're going to get"

So I'm working my way up the chain! Next I have to somehow find out who my new doctor's doctor is.

Eventually you'd just get to David Tennant

Don't you have a paper to be writing?

We must also find the ultimate mailman for spongebob

The ultimate doctor lives in a blue police box.

Well. In the UK at least, it'd be one of these two:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Keogh https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clare_Marx

What if he doctors himself? Ya Know to save money.

Conversely, statistically speaking, somewhere in this world is the worst doctor.

Or you just find a bald Doctor

For general issues or issues that pertain to their specialty they treat themselves. If the issue is outside of their scope, e.g. an orthopedic surgeon who has a gastrointestinal issue, then they see the appropriate specialist just like any other patient.

Reminds me of the SMBC comic about finding the source of all bad words.

Actually it's more of a Doctor Web, like the web of life.

This would likely lead a short chain towards the nearest married doctor couple. He's his wife's doctor, she's his doctor, The end,

Same goes for barbers/hair stylists, dentists and such.

That what every one that buys pot tries to do. However, you'd just end up at some college lecture course. Not very helpful.

The one without the thigh muscle.

Joke's on you, all doctors are doctoring each other in a circle.

The ultimate doctor lives deep in da jungle in his tiki hut

Or is it a never-ending circle?

A doctor's doctor is not necessarily a better doctor, just a different person. The doctor may know exactly what is wrong with him/her self but for one of several reasons will be unable to render treatment to themselves.

Pretty sure, quite quickly, you'd end up in an endless loop.

Human:
"It's a web man, not a line."

-That is all

It will be a loop. One doctor's doctor might be his patient's patient.

What about teachers? Do we just end up at the first teacher? If so, who is it? This will be a big face reveal.

Doctors are specialized, so if I'm a doctor who focuses on the brain I may not know much about rashes or arthritis. So if I have a diseases in not an expert in I want an expert's input. You also can't do your own physical exam, like looking into your own throat. Lastly you're not supposed to write prescriptions for yourself.

Tldr just because you go to another doctor when you're such doesn't mean you're a worse doctor.

There once was a stonecutter...

but who is the ultimate doctor's doctor?

The metric x's doctor's doctor is restricted based on proximity.

Even if they know about a better doctor, if the doctor is too far away they won't be their doctor.

This search won't reliably result in the best doctor in the world. Consider the case where the best doctor lives in a remote area.

Costs. Also, 'Not accepting new patients at this time'

TIL that while non-doctors who self-diagnose are always wrong, doctors who self-diagnose are always right.

Every doctor has a doctor who is not him. There is no ultimate doctor.

This guy is the world's ultimate doctor

Dr Sins: http://imgur.com/Hw1AuBq

What if you only became a doctor so that you could fix yourself, and never have to pay medical bills?

Reminds me of spongebob an the mailmen

If your doctor can't diagnose him/herself, are you sure you want them to be YOUR doctor?

My cousin just signed up for a private practice as an OBGYN. It's funny to think, but his health insurance is cheaper through his wife's employer than his own. Anyway, he was told if he or his wife needs anything, to just come in, and there won't be any charges. I assume that means things just get written off.

While the graph may be directed it's not necessarily acyclic.

I find trying to go up the Doctor chain get's stressful.

You will often hear: Doctors are bad patients!

They try to treat themselves and they end up not taking the medicine and so...

He knows too much...

I did this to find a better apartment. Lady showing me some old 80s apartments turned out to live in a brand new complex nearby under the same company. Got to be the first tenant in my unit.

My father was a doctor before he passed away from cancer 3 years ago. He didn't have a doctor, he had many doctors, and he thought they were all idiots. I spent many of moments with him in the hospital where he would correct their mistakes. He technically died of a potassium overdose, caused by a dumb doctor giving him the wrong drugs...

/r/spongebob

edit: Fuck, this is real. I like this show, but it's getting out of hand!

And what if it's a circle instead of a hierarchy?

My shower thoughts are like who is my mom's mom's mom's mom's and so on..I can never reach the ultimate mom :)

I work a lot with doctors and generally they are pretty bad at actually going to the doctor themselves, often they self-treat. However, the 'ultimate doctors' are the usually ones working at research hospitals as specialists...the problem is they only want to see you if you have something really freaky going on. The idea is that they publish the best practice guidelines for the lesser docs to follow, but it often ends up being a bit like chinese whispers

This is a pretty common thing. Last time I saw it was asking his barber who cut his hair to find the ultimate barber.

Edit: Whoops someone already said this. My mistake.

My orthopedic surgeon was recently going over my charts before surgery and asked about some medication I was on. He then said he has similar problems and wondered if he should go see a doctor because he hadn't in like 10 years. He was literally asking me questions about my condition to see if it applied to his symptoms. Cool guy, great surgeon, but weird interaction.

Wait so, if you're a doctor you can't be your own doctor? Is there an actual rule against that?

Dr. Who?

They could be each other's doctors.

way to steal a jerry seinfeld joke

Oh, /r/Showerthoughts. Why do you make my head hurt so?

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