The Allure of the Quick Fix

And the promise of slowing down

Alex Blajan via Unsplash

In the U.S., we’re conditioned to expect quick-fix solutions for things that go wrong with our bodies. We want the doctor to tell us what ails us, and then fix it. Medical professionals can offer us medication or surgery, and send us on our way.

We believe we don’t have the time or the resources for anything else: resources spent on our health would be time away from work and money away from the stuff we want. So we go to the doctor to seek solutions that won’t cost us time and that will be covered by our health insurance. Just make this problem go away, we think, I’ve got places to go.

We go for the “right now” fix, and get on with our lives.

What’s wrong with relying on medical “quick fixes” to get us well?

The impulse to seek a quick fix is understandable, but in many cases, it leads to bigger problems. Let’s consider some of them.

1. When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. This is the reason so many people want a prescription for antibiotics for cold symptoms. Will it help? No! Will it hurt? Maybe! But they’re what we have and what we know, so we swing away, even if waiting it out would work just as well. The truth is, medicine can’t solve everything. If we use the wrong tool for the job just because it’s what we have to hand, we’ll likely do some harm.
2. A quick fix can stop us from figuring out the underlying cause. Treating things like pain, inflammation, or even elevated blood pressure without a thorough evaluation of the situation can set you up for a repeating cycle of symptoms and treatment rather than true healing. Digging deeper takes time, and sometimes we find answers we don’t like (like we need to change our behaviors). If we keep covering up the symptoms, though, they’ll keep coming back.
3. Most people (even some healthcare professionals) don’t have a very good understanding of scientific evidence and statistics. We tend to overrate the effectiveness of drugs and underrate the side effects. We don’t have a grasp of relative risk and absolute risk. We favor “doing something” over “doing nothing”, even when the evidence doesn’t support it.
4. Focusing on fast fixes can make it harder to accept that some things don’t have a single answer. When we’re used to a symptom-diagnosis-treatment-cure sequence, it feels disheartening and confusing when things don’t go that way (and sometimes they don’t).
5. For many, something “high tech” seems more legitimate than something “low tech”, even if the evidence doesn’t support this. For example, cognitive behavioral therapy is a more effective treatment for many types of insomnia than Ambien. It doesn’t create a dramatic improvement in a single day, so the improvement might be a little harder to see, but over time, it has a much more positive effect on sleep quality and sleep patterns¹. People react to such low-tech interventions with “that can’t possibly work” — even when evidence shows that it does. This leads us to use more expensive treatments with more side effects.

Despite these issues, many medical interventions are valuable.

They can save lives and prevent suffering, without question. But we should reconsider the way we think about their use. Instead of considering medical intervention to be the best (or only) way to care for the body, what if we thought of it as one tool in a vast toolbox? This is the promise of integrative medicine, an approach that uses all available modalities for healing and prioritizes less invasive, gentler measures. We don’t need to think about Western medicine, alternative medicine, and personal wellness practices as an either/or choice; we can and should use any approach that works for us. From where we’re standing now, though, this will take some imagination.

How can we reimagine caring for our health?

1. Economics. Health insurance has confused us about health and distorted the market for services. A few health insurance plans pay for benefits like acupuncture and massage, but most are focused on hospital care, physician visits, diagnostic tests, and prescription drugs. This insurance is expensive, and so is the medical care it helps us pay for. This system both cuts into our financial resources and leads us to believe that covered benefits are somehow superior. We’re hesitant to commit our remaining resources to things that help us stay well. Certainly, we need healthcare payment reform — but while we’re working on that, we might need to think about what we’re really doing with the money we have. Do you buy a new iPhone without flinching but balk at the price of a bodywork session? Buy beer but don’t have enough for organic vegetables? What you’re willing to pay for is a reflection of what you value. We may never have considered the value we place on our bodies and our wellbeing.
2. Values. In the U.S., we tend to work a lot. We value productivity and individual accomplishment. We trust what we think more than what we feel. Sometimes, we’re so intent on not missing a beat that we ignore symptoms until they’re totally disabling. We don’t really believe that it’s okay, let alone, good, to attend to our own bodily needs. It may never have occurred to us to challenge this narrative.
3. Culture. In our busy, results-driven culture, slowing down or taking time for wellness can feel anathema. This is to our detriment. We both refuse to slow down and expect everything to happen fast. Sometimes, lasting change isn’t fast. Learning to recognize when slow, steady progress is occurring can greatly improve our ability to make and sustain meaningful change.

How do we start slowing down?

Let’s start conversations in our workplaces and communities about making space to care for ourselves. Maybe this means bringing plants into the office, normalizing taking mental health days, letting schedules be flexible to accommodate therapy appointments, or ensuring time for a breather between meetings. Imagine what would make you feel good, and say it out loud. None of this is necessary “medicine”, but it’s integral to wellness. It’s time to embrace it all. Over time, giving some of our resources to wellness will decrease our need for short-term, quick-fix treatment — but don’t worry, it will still be there when we need it.

References

1. Trauer, J. et al. (2015). Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Chronic Insomnia: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. Annals of Internal Medicine, 163(3). https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26054060/