| | Recently, I got a chance to see patients in actual hospital setting, in an oncology outpatient service and also the ER, emergency room (Things are very different than in a television series - most people don't wear makeups and there's no hollywood stars). Moving fast in ER, observing how "bad news" is delivered with a meticulous plan, and finally reminding myself that I should work harder to understand the human's diseases, and also the sick person himself. "Hi, I am Terence, a medical student. I've got a few questions to ask you about your visit, may I sit down?" It's only in a few years, that I will be expected to say, "Hi, I am Dr. Sio, I will take good care of you." What would happen between these two points? A 3-step licensing exam, many night calls, and medical textbooks, watching Hong gradate from Harvey Mudd, and if God guides us, hopefully a marriage too. Sometimes, I am at loss of words when patients told me absolutely sad things, or when I see the weaken body of an 82-years-old gentleman inflicted by metastatic melanoma. A suicidal girl in the ward, who carried a medical history of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) because she was raped by her own dad. A 33-yr old lady who's a ten-yr survivor of rectal cancer. An Africian American with diarrhea 10-15 times per day for 2 weeks and I worked out a solution of antibiotics side-effect and ran down the list of organisms with the fellow doctor. A first digital exam. Physical examination of a female chest that carried the merciless marks of breast cancers. At the Mortality and Morbidity conference, a 36-yo Chinese man who died of lung cancer and on the powerpoint slides, the cancer cells staring right back at me, into the deepest fear of my heart, laughing at my inferiority in fertile efforts of even imagining to assist anything. Above all, for every patient, in their own story, our Lord is in control. He comforts, and He's waiting and weeping for us to go back into His arms. |
| | Posted 9/13/2007 10:59 PM - 5 comments
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