Doctors

This is pretty weird, because I've seen more doctors in my short life than most people see in their entire lifetimes, including that nasty bit at the end when you're in the hospital for weeks or months and everyone is just kind of waiting for the inevitable - but I didn't get until literally today that it REALLY matters what doctor you see. Obviously not true if you have an ear infection or strep throat or other things that I mean, I could diagnose and the closest I've come to formal training is a college course in molecular biology. But when you start getting into the stuff that really matters, that actually impacts (please, no notes about the use of "impact" - I use words as I wish regardless of what other people believe to be the correct usage) your day-to-day life and makes or breaks or reasons for living, the doctor you end up with is critical to whether you will succeed or fail in your quest for health. Take one (of many) current examples. A friend, experiencing narcoleptic-type symptoms and having taken the requisite sleep studies finally sees a neurology sleep specialist at a top university hospital. He prescribes a medication that does not work, and doesn't work with an extremely large proportion of patients (I would guess about 70% based on the research I've done). She had previously taken a relatively strong medication developed by the military to keep fighter pilots awake for 24 hours that wore off after initially working, so this was a stupid choice on the doctor's part - clearly she needed a strong medication. On the next visit, he not only refused to try a different medication (there are several that could address the issue) he continued on to diagnose her with fibromyalgia, a quite serious disease - however, she has none of the symptoms other than hypersomnia, which is completely insufficient for a diagnosis of fibromyalgia, a disease that often prevents people from climbing stairs and leaves them in incredible pain. She fights back and forth, trying to explain that she doesn't have this disease and that she desperately needs medication as she is unable to function at work. The doctor - couldn't care less.
So she explains all this to me and it strikes me as yet another case of obnoxious, self-contained, heartless doctors doing whatever they can to get hundreds of dollars from insurance companies while providing nothing for their patients. So far, we haven't found a solution but have determined that this doctor is a more junior doctor and I am anticipating that the scheduled visit with the more senior doctor I brokered will be more fruitful, in that at least she should be reasonable about the situation.
It occurred to me as well as I had an appointment with a doctor this morning and I called him yesterday, having misplaced the appointment card, to ask when the appointment was for. He said 10. I wrote down 10. I put it on both my calendars. I am there circa 9:47. He comes in, says, you're here early, I say yes, because I'm thinking, well yes technically 9:47 is not 10:00 so fair enough if we want to split hairs. But then the other bloke in the waiting room goes back with him. And I'm like, seriously? I called YESTERDAY. Afternoon. I couldn't have been more clear. He couldn't have been more clear. And I thought again, wow, I really should get a better doctor. Because if he can't even tell me my appointment time, how well is his brain really functioning? And how well is he understanding my symptoms and able to address them? My guess is not that well. Like now I'm all freaked out that he has early alzheimers and I'm in this disasterous situation where I am getting prescriptions and tests from someone with diminished capabilities.
This could go on forever but I need to address a headache.