If you get on well with you pdoc and want to talk about it more, then read this
Incidence and Prevalence | AREP
(I know it's not from a MH website, but it's a good definition)
And knowing the stuff in there, ask him/ her the same thing. You'll get one statistic for prevalence (number of people that get it in the population) and then incidence - which will be more interesting, because that'll give you a better idea. Quantifying it means being able to picture it, for me, it's one thing to say "X might happen to you" (which freaks me out) to saying "you have a one in thousand chance of X" (which isn't so bad).
Hope this helps!