“A patient can have has many diseases as he darn well pleases.”

Why is it that modern medicine is so focused on finding that one disease to explain all of a patient’s problems?

I think it’s very rare (if not impossible?) for the human body to be only affected by one problem at a time. Since the body is a complex system of intertwining functions, it’s only common sense they would all impact each other, producing a different set of problems in each patient.

(A classic example: an asthma patient with a bad flu. The asthma is going to impact how they handle the flu, as well as potentially produce different side effects and complications.)

It’s such a back step in medicine that there is such an emphasis (perhaps a billing and insurance problem?) in finding one diagnosis per problem.

One day, they’re going to look back on our ‘modern medicine’ as a back step in the history of how we approach treating human diseases…