Documentaries about health tend to follow a certain narrative.
Something bad happens, someone is sick, a lot of money is spent, and everyone is sad.
Irrespective of whether the person in question recovers or not, these sorts of series tend not to be the most uplifting of tales.
And yet, we enjoy it. We are a dispiriting bunch. This is simply the way things are.
However, a new medical-based series has just dropped onto Netflix and it’s rather uplifting – because a load of rare and uncommon health mysteries are helped to be solved by people on the internet.
And yeah, you’re going to find yourself ultimately furious at the US health system, but sure that’s a given at this stage.
Based on the long-running New York Times column by Dr Lisa Sanders, Diagnosis follows the journeys of seven patients as they struggle to find out why they are sick, what is causing their illness, and how best to receive treatment to give them some form of quality of life.
But Dr Sanders isn’t just relying on her own expertise – she’s crowd sourcing the answers as she shares the patient’s stories online to see what the public come back with.
The first episode of the series documents the story of Angel, a woman from Las Vegas who has lived with chronic pain for almost a decade.
Having failed to be diagnosed by doctors in the US – and considering filing for bankruptcy due to her steep medical bills – Angel turns to Dr Sanders.
She eventually ends up travelling to Turin, Italy where she meets a group of specialists who run some simple enough tests and eventually give her the diagnosis she had been looking for for nine years.
The series is keen to ensure that the audience knows that medical conditions should not be diagnosed by strangers on the internet, and that the documentary is meant for entertainment purposes only.
Only when a series of doctors and medical professionals cannot for the life of them figure out what’s wrong with you, then (and only then) should you take your ailment to the web.
And who knows, you might be able to nab some cheaper healthcare out of it too.
You can check out the trailer for Diagnosis here:
