I am sorry if that is your evaluation of healthcare.
It is. It's why they call them 'practicing' physicians. Health professionals have to earn my trust and respect. Few do.
And the patient themselves plans a role in this.
Only if the doctors allow them. My biggest gripe is that many don't listen.
As to mistreatment, here I assume you don’t mean abusing the patient.
No, I am referring to what many would call malpractice. They prescribe the wrong treatment.
I had a PPP (Partial Palatal Pharyngoplasty) with a tonsillectomy to cure sleep apnea. I'm fat and it was assumed that it was obstructive apnea. It was decided within moments after a sleep study that surgery was essential. I was given absolutely no alternative and O2 levels were so depressed during my sleep study that it was scheduled for the next day. I was absolutely scared into this surgery. I indicated that I was allergic to Demoral, and yet it was the pain relief they gave me (on demand pump). After the first shot, with the resultant dull headache, I didn't punch it again. When asked the next morning why I didn't use it, I pointed out it was Demerol, to which the nurse said "yeah, so?" Wow. I asked them to read the Rx I was allergic to and there it was, the very first thing on the list. He blamed me for not pointing it out when I first figured out it was Demerol. Go figure, huh? It's not their job to read what I'm allergic to when I'm unconscious. There were a few other gaffes, but that was pretty bad. Guess what? My snoring continued and my oxygen sats were still way, way low. Oh, it wasn't obstructive apnea after all, but another kind and maybe you should try a c-pap? I've been on a c-pap some 25 years now. Wow. I have at least a dozen stories that involve my family and medical incompetence including my son's MRSA. With the help of Google, he identified the problem before the Doctors. When he mentioned it, he was verbally slapped down by the doctor for such a preposterous idea. A week later they came to the same conclusion but he nearly died from the delay.
I'm not alone in my distrust of the medical system. Yeah, I know there are a lot of pressures, economic as well as time and number of patients who misuse the system. I absolutely avoid going to a doctor at this time. I am my own best advocate. I am my own best doctor. No one knows my body like I do and no one, NO ONE worries about my quality of life more than I do. Sometimes, I have to give in, like with the surgeon who fixed my broken leg. He was great. He listened. He gave me choices. He did a more than competent job. He has my trust and my respect. No, not everyone in that Fijian hospital earned that, but they were far better than any American hospital I've been to.