Anxiety vs. Medical Illness: Dr's Advice Unraveling Health Anxiety

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Are you struggling with health anxiety? Do you find it challenging to trust doctors or constantly seek reassurance from them? Perhaps you fear that your doctors aren't taking your concerns seriously due to your health anxiety. If any of these sound familiar, this video sheds insight on those topics.

Dr. Pradko sheds light on the challenges faced by doctors in diagnosing anxiety-related symptoms and shares valuable insights into their protocols and practices. From initial evaluations and tests to referrals for psychological treatment, you'll gain a comprehensive understanding of the medical perspective on health anxiety.

Anxiety manifests in numerous physical and mental symptoms, many of which can mimic genuine medical conditions. Our medical system, while designed to identify potential health issues, often falls short when it comes to recognizing and addressing anxiety disorders. This disconnect can lead to prolonged uncertainty, excessive testing, and unnecessary worry for those with health anxiety.

If you've found yourself caught in this cycle of seeking answers, visiting multiple doctors, and experiencing heightened anxiety, you're not alone. The video explores the challenges patients face within the medical system and how health anxiety can inadvertently be reinforced, hindering effective treatment.

Health anxiety, formerly referred to as hypochondria is diagnosed as Illness anxiety disorder, somatic symptom disorder or sometimes panic disorder. It behaves like OCD due to the cycle caused by obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors like reassurance seeking, body symptom checking, ruminating, excessive googling and avoidance and safety behaviors.

People with health anxiety and other anxiety disorders like panic disorder score high on a trait called anxiety sensitivity. Anxiety sensitivity is the belief and misinterpretation that anxiety symptoms and sensations felt in the body are dangerous.

Health anxiety can hook your attention and reel you in. It can convince you that something may be seriously wrong, and can activate your fear response. It pulls you in and away from everything else that’s important to you.

Health anxiety thrives on your vulnerabilities and catastrophic thinking, where minor symptoms are blown out of proportion, leading to thinking of the worst case scenarios. But, health anxiety is a treatable condition.

I would like to extend an invitation to check out my online course for health anxiety recovery. It provides a comprehensive framework to help you overcome health anxiety, reclaim joy in your life, and develop effective coping strategies.

Until next time, I will see you in session,
Paige

(Although Paige Pradko is a licensed psychotherapist, the views expressed on this video and this YouTube channel including comments or any related content should not be taken for medical, psychological or psychiatric advice. Always contact your physician and mental health provider before making any decisions related to your physical or mental health.)

[PaigePradkoTherapy]

👉👉👉 PDF: Why Do I Feel That in my Body? Explanations of Bodily Symptoms Due to Anxiety, Stress and Panic

👉👉👉 Do you have Health Anxiety?
Health anxiety self assessment

👉👉👉 Health Anxiety Course

[louisgeen]

The only thing that stands in my way from fully recovering from health anxiety is that im scared what long term anxiety does to my body. Like i have this 8 years now and i just want to know im safe. I feel anxiety the whole day.

[aspirindamage]

this is wild. ive been to your guys’ practice, my whole family has. i have an upcoming appointment with my “family doctor” at the practice in a month… i genuinely, from the bottom of my heart, love you guys, and i had no clue about this channel. i am currently somewhat crippled by my ocd/health anxiety but have been finding comfort in your videos and am researching therapists and stuff in the metro area for exposure therapy or something to finally help. hopefully i get something soon but until then, this has been amazing.

[TheFireGlory]

I’ve been watching your videos and it’s been a blessing. I developed health anxiety. My first scary palpitation was in 2015 when I was 29 years old. I was sleep deprived, frustrated, angry, going through a long period of uncertainty. I was also hiding my emotions from everyone. My heart, onde day, out of the blue, skipped beats non-stop for 10-15 seconds, I couldn’t breath, my vision blacked out and my limbs started to tingle. I was sure I was dying. Well, that was just the first one. I’ve been to the ER 4 times since then always thinking it’s a heart attack and it’s the end. I’ve had very detailed cardio scans and screenings at a heart clinic. Nothing wrong. The doctors always say I’m healthy and my heart is not the problem. Until the day one of them asked “what do you take for your panic attacks?” 😅 I said I was never diagnosed with that condition and he said “Well, there’s nothing wrong with your heart neither your blood. If you’ve been to the ER so many times with the same results, I’d recommend you see a therapist”. We’ll, my condition has improved. I’ve been in therapy for a year now and I’ve learned
to interrupt the episodes with ice and other techniques, but they are always scary. I had a skipped beat last night followed by lightheadedness which was strange enough to make me very anxious. Good thing I was on the phone with my fiancée who’s a psychiatrist. She helps me a lot! I hope I get over this one day. Your videos help me incredibly because I feel safer if I know what’s going on.

[delori]

In my experience, most physicians automatically assume everything is anxiety, and its the patients job to prove otherwise. And many people, especially women, minorities, and especially those with histoty of anxiety, dont get diagnosed when they have actual medical conditions. Physicians often include in their notes inappropriate pysch labels and those really only serve the patient to get blacklisted and not listened to. More women, minorities, mentally ill people die due to deglect, misdiagnosis and underdiagnosis whether they have a mental illness or not. There is an implicit bias in the healthcare system, and it does plenty harm on its own.

[gingerty]

I was diagnosed with oral lichen planus, a horrible autoimmune disease a year ago an went into menopause around the same time. The health diagnosis is the root of my anxiety, the fear of the unknown, being scared of the future especially as I'm getting older. Before then i was always the one that took everything in stride and didn't worry about things. After seeing so many drs thru the years tho for other health problems i KNEW i had, i lost trust in drs and have no faith in them. But eventually i think that caused me to have white coat syndrome. I'm a mess.

[fishinfromscratch]

Thank you for this. I've been to the ER when i had my initial panic attack, multiple doctors and specialists since and not 1 time has anyone ever suggested that my issues were anxiety based. I myself sought out a therapist and have improved because of it. The problem now is i would like a medical professional to help with my recovery plan and that seems impossible to find.

[chrissimpson]

You are the best of the best I’m saving for your course I need it in the worst way I go through all of this plus some every day I really want to get a session going soon.

[MrUforobogrendizer]

What a wonderful video, but not a surprise from this amazing channel. Thank you for everything you do!

[zinamussmann]

Thanks for this. I'd love to see someone do a video on health anxiety and genetic tests such as Ancestry. You can now get the raw data from your test and plug it into numerous 3rd party software. Many times a rare devastating disease comes up but people don't understand these tests aren't medical grade and are not diagnostic tools. There's many complexities to understanding results/ accessing actual risk in relation to disease rates-- and often the information in the raw data is flat out wrong. This is what started me on my latest spiral. And even though I sought out information that should be reassuring, it had the opposite effect. Now I have to learn to live with the information, so I'd implore anyone with health anxiety to not plug raw data into a 3rd party site.

[Ladybird]

My worry is long Covid which I had a recovered from 2 years ago but a couple of months ago I burnt out after a new job I gave it up I felt better but now I’m tired again & keep worrying it’s back . But I got a part time job & I’m ok and feel fine there but at home I’m on edge & panic watch for all manor of tiredness & repeat not excepting it could be I’m not sleeping well and worrying . How can I stop seeking my worse fear . I feel like I’m on the edge

[GuntherSnaps]

my experience was the opposite. I'm avoided doctors because I don't trust them. My mom died, I finally got the courage to go see a doctor, i walked in, introduced myself and told her sorry if I'm weird but I have an anxiety problem, now everything i tell her, even showing her my scan showing kidney stones she blows it off as anxiety. I need a new doctor.

[motowrld]

I’ve been suffering from health anxiety for 8 years now. I try to tell my self all the time that it’s just health anxiety because if it was something else something would have happened to me by now.

[alisonhoke]

I would like to look into your courses for fighting this. I have been suffering with severe cardiac anxiety for 13 years now. It has been manageable for a few years and returned when I turned 43, and entered perimenopause. Its destroyed my quality of life. I just want to feel normal again.

[JohnD]

My anxiety is so bad I think about my hearth health everyday. Thinking I will have a heart attack. Takes away my living in the “ now “ i experience heart flutter, tingling, rapid heart beat. Etc. just can’t seem to shake it 😢

[BrandonRodriguez-fq]

Hi Paige!

I love how you mentioned the issue with white coat syndrome as I definitely have this. The thing is that I have anxiety in general surrounding blood pressure so even at home when I take a reading I feel anxious and it’s elevated. While I have improved a lot over the past month, I feel like I have plateaued somewhat l. I am a healthy 25 year old male who exercises religiously and has drastically improved their diet over the last couple of months. I had been exercising for years but my diet could’ve improved so that is what I’ve focused on. I just don’t know if its anxiety that is causing my elevated BP (this is my suspicion) or something else. I have no family history of high BP and have been cleared by a cardiologist as well with associated testing. I also have no history of high BP before I fell into the anxiety cycle over the summer due to a panic attack that lasted all day. Can you offer any advice in my situation? Thanks for all you do!

[youtubealiasoriginal]

Great valuable video😊 Im one of those patients, been everywhere for years

[chilenapromedioRU]

According to my mum, I've suffered from bronchopulmonary issues since I was a baby from months of age. I was diagnosed as asthmatic and allergic to certain things after being tested when I was about 7 years old. At about 14 I asked my then bronchopulmonary doctor why I was asthmatic and she told me it could be "psychosomatic". Everything was "psychosomatic" back then, no doctors gave propoer answers.
It wasn't until I suffered a trauma event at age 22 that I was diagnosed with PTSD and panic attacks that I was diagnosed with GAD.
So It's difficult for me to understand.
What's the meaning of "health anxiety"? It's the same as what they used to call "psychosomatic"?
I'm very comfused.

[karinastewart]

this me everyday heart attack health anxiety 😢 I hate it I ruminate on it too much my worst fear

[WTB_Acts]

My health anxiety is awful right now. I think a lot of it is being amplified by my Klonopin taper. I'm finally down to 0.5 a day. Next, I will be down to 0.25 for three weeks. I'm very nervous to do this, but I want to be away from this medication, and never take it again.