If an honest mechanic tells you your brakes are going bad, you can probably believe him, since an auto mechanic is a technician of the purely physical and an automobile is a purely physical thing. But, if a doctor tries to tell you he knows for sure your number is up, he is by definition speaking beyond his competence, because a person, according to virtually all world religions, is not just a physical thing, but a spiritual being, a soul or spirit temporarily inhabiting a physical body.

Since physicians quite wisely leave the spiritual realm to priests, ministers, and rabbis, he or she is always venturing such a prediction based on only part of the picture, like a meteorologist who will only consider one side of his weather map and not the rest. Would you accept the prognostications of such an incompetent weather man without question, without flipping the channel to see what his competitors were saying? 
Probably not.

One can never safely neglect the spiritual vitality of a person when predicting his fate.

It is clear to me from my own personal experience that doctors should no more be considered gods than any other practitioner in our lives but instead should be looked upon as a professional class blessed with widely varying degrees of competence, skill, knowledge, and integrity. During my six year battle with cancer, I have run into doctors, even specialists, who had not mastered the equivalent of “See Spot Run” in their professions and others who proved to be brilliant beyond measure.

Yet, all were being greeted by the same honorific while being accorded the exact same degree of professional respect by many.
How can you tell the difference? By shopping around and doing your own research as much as you can, just as you would when purchasing a  new house or car.

Like many of us, doctors are often harried, overworked people, burdened with too many responsibilities and not enough time to give each one the time and attention it deserves.

Your solution: Seek alternatives as readily as you would choose a new purveyor of pizza delivery if the old one wasn't proving up to snuff.

Doctors often diagnose based on prevailing physical trends in the body. Yet, it's been my experience that just as body parts can get worse, they can also get better, often for reasons that no one can quite put their finger on, including those yielding stethoscopes and probes.

Above all, take charge of your own health care as much as you would make sure your car is under control as you drive down the thruway on a windswept day.

True none of us will live forever in our current state. Yet, all of us can persevere with greater hope and conviction as we strive to protect and honor the life that God has given us.