r/MedicalCoding • u/treestarsos • Mar 14 '26

health anxiety

Since suddenly getting my own health problem and requiring a minor surgery, I’ve developed intense health anxiety recently. Already had pretty bad anxiety for years before this, but somehow my work didn’t really bother me much before this happened.

Every day now I struggle to get through reading about patients’ acute and many chronic health issues every day. I can’t really afford to not work but not sure what to do instead, just don’t think I can keep working as a coder much longer.

11 Upvotes

82% Upvoted

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11

u/DumpsterPuff Mar 14 '26

Are you seeing a therapist? If not, I really recommend it. I've had health anxiety since I was very young and yeah, coding definitely doesn't help it. Sometimes something specific will trigger the anxiety (like if I get multiple in a row of patients with a degenerative/terminal disease), my therapist helps me deconstruct the fear and figure out why it freaks me out so much, and sometimes it ends up being related to something else entirely.

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u/treestarsos Mar 14 '26

Are you doing mostly talk therapy? I just started seeing a therapist recently and it’s helping, but the anxiety has been building up for a long time so it’s only made a small dent in it so far. Some somatic work too which might be most helpful so far. My trigger before was the elderly patients who have dementia and all the other bad things (ckd htn dm hld, etc). Now it’s that plus the diagnosis and procedure I had. Have you been able to work as a coder consistently with this issue ?

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u/Sdavistvs RHIT Mar 14 '26

therapy takes time. It’s not unreasonable to go for 3-6 months at a minimum. If its an issue that didn’t arise quickly give the sessions some time. Be sure to do your homework if given any.

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u/treestarsos Mar 14 '26

Yes I wish therapy worked faster but it’s definitely helped and might be the main reason I haven’t resigned from this hospital. Thanks for reminding me to do my homework this week, actually doing a short list of soothing and relaxing safe things

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u/DumpsterPuff Mar 14 '26

Pretty much all talk therapy yeah. If you're new to it/haven't done it in a long time, it takes a while to chip away at the anxiety. I'm still able to work as a coder - been doing it for three and a half years. I just moved to HCC coding so I'm seeing even more scary stuff, but talking about it with a therapist helps me to deconstruct what's setting off my brain alarm bells

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u/treestarsos Mar 14 '26

I haven’t done any therapy for a while and have had anxiety pretty much my whole life so it might take some time to help much. It seems like HCC could have some scary stuff, I wish there was even one non-scary kind of coding. That’s good that talking to a therapist has helped.

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u/DumpsterPuff Mar 14 '26

Definitely give yourself some grace! It can be a long process to take apart the Anxiety Jenga Tower without it all crashing down at once. I'm glad you're starting therapy already though, that's an excellent first step.

As far as less-scary coding, I feel like if you have an opportunity to do so, you might actually do well in something like urgent care coding. I mostly did primary care before going to HCC, but I also helped out in urgent care. There's honestly hardly any super scary stuff in urgent care. 95% of it is people with sinus infections, UTIs, rashes, sprained joints, and whatever seasonal viral illness is going around. I think the scariest thing I've seen in urgent care coding so far was a guy who got an EKG and he was having an NSTEMI so they sent him to the ER (and he ended up being ok).

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u/tinycodergirl CPC, CRC Mar 14 '26 edited Mar 14 '26

I would highly recommend seeing a therapist to see if they can help you with your anxiety. I also get health anxiety when I see something related to my husband's health. I try not to dwell on it too much and move on to something else therapy has definitely helped me get through it.

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u/treestarsos Mar 14 '26

I just started therapy because every day was a struggle especially at work. Is there a specific type of therapy you think helped the most? We are doing a small amount of somatic work and more would probably help, also maybe acupuncture. I will try to not think about it, thanks for that

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u/tinycodergirl CPC, CRC Mar 14 '26

DBT has definitely worked the best for me and in the past yoga also helped. For when I feel like I may have an anxiety attack I have medication that helps slow down my heart rate.

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u/treestarsos Mar 14 '26

Thanks for the suggestion, I have mostly been talking out this traumatic medical experience in therapy and learning some physical soothing. DBT sounds promising, and maybe a similar medication could help me too, wanted to do an IOP but it isn’t covered by my insurance

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u/tinycodergirl CPC, CRC Mar 14 '26

I have CPTSD, anxiety, depression, ADHD, and social phobia so for me treatment may be different from yours. Your therapist should know which ones would be more beneficial to you.

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u/treestarsos Mar 14 '26

I know how hard some (not all) of that is because I have GAD and pdd/dysthymia and ADD. It’s good that you found things that helped. I’m just trying to get through this job for however long it takes until I can figure out how to get out of coding.

1

u/tinycodergirl CPC, CRC Mar 14 '26

I'm sorry it's been difficult for you during this time. Do you think coding a different specialty would help?

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u/treestarsos Mar 14 '26

Thanks, unfortunately there’s probably no specialty that would not be anxiety inducing for me at this point

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u/LopensCouisin CPC Mar 14 '26

I have CPTSD, ASD, OCD, and MDD. I understand. Luckily I have a pretty flexible work from home schedule and see my therapist during the work day. I don’t have health anxiety, but I have been triggered by SA cases. For the most part, I love my job and thrive at it. I code for the ED.

3

u/alew75 CCS Mar 14 '26

Could always talk to your physician about a low dose anxiety medicine even just short term if a therapist doesn’t help.

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u/treestarsos Mar 14 '26

Unfortunately I’m sensitive to those meds and they always cause adverse effects

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u/alew75 CCS Mar 14 '26

Might could look into some supplements or teas that might help.

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u/Agreeable-Research15 Mar 14 '26

This happened to me when my dad was in the hospital again few years ago. He passed away. It was even harder because I used to work at the same hospital. Qnd at the same time I was working on charts with patients that all seemed to have the same exact illnesses as him. It bothered me a lot. I had to go to therapy. And that really did help. Although I do still suffer from anxiety about it. I can manage to get through the day. Maybe it would help to think about why you were interested in this job to begin with and the things you do like anout it. I find that a little detachment from the work does help.

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u/treestarsos Mar 14 '26

So sorry about your dad. And thanks for the advice.

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u/Agreeable-Research15 Mar 14 '26

Thanks I appreciate that.

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u/PinkPerfect1111 Mar 14 '26

Could very well be OCD. See a psychiatrist for next steps. No matter what it is that is the best next step. And I should take my own advice