"To attend a doctor"

Question

How would you say "I attended (ie went to) a doctor for 20 years"? Thank you

Nice question! Never thought of that! - CarterTF, Apr 9, 2017

Answer 1

(Yo) me atendí con un médico 20 años. You could also say durante 20 años. The verb is ATENDERSE. It implies that he took care of my health during that period. It is not only to go to his office.

Another possibility would be : Un médico me atendió durante 20 años. ( I prefer the first)

To mean only GOING to a doctor I would say: Concurrí a lo de un (mismo) médico durante 20 años.

Examples: El Dr. Pérez me atiende en su consultorio. La Dra. López Saavedra atiende los días martes. La Dra. Machado nunca me atendió ni a mí ni a mi hija.

Answer 2

I'm not sure if I am correct, but I believe that asistir a is to attend and atender is to assist. They are false cognates, and quite confusing. I think the post above would be correct, but I think that you can say it another way as well.

Therefore I believe the sentence you are trying to translate would be "Yo asistí a un doctor por 20 años.

OR

Yo he asistido a un doctor por 20 años. (I have attended a doctor for 20 years.)

Answer 3

Thank you both for taking the time to reply. It is one of those terms which is difficult to translate with a dictionary. Asistir is the first verb which comes to mind when thinking of attending but you normally see it in the context of attending a function, performance, etc, while atender (in non-reflexive form) would be seen from the point of view of the doctor attending to the patient. I assume that Polenta1 being hispanohablante should know. Muchísimas gracias