The RATS Newspaper has a column for letters to the editor and a recent comment on doctors not listening to their patients touched a not so melodious chord in me. So I wrote this as I waited for 3 hours in Uni... hospital to see a doctor which took only 10 minutes to deal with my case. I was further subjected to waiting another 1 hour for the nuclear appointment counter to open as it was lunch hours then and another 30 minutes for the medication. In all I was at the hospital from 9.30am to 4pm. Even the dead will groan impatiently and the sick will have more reasons to be sick!
To The Editor, 11/12/08
I refer to MBA’s emotive letter in ‘Try lending patients an ear, too, doctor’ and Edward Wong’s informative supporting letter. Edward had helpfully highlighted that 50 medical schools in US had incorporated the subject of ‘spirituality’ into their courses. This is probably due to the dawning realisation that man is not just a biological machine but also a ‘spiritual being’. We possess conscience and emotions which until today medical science had not been able to locate its existence in the biological brain even though they can tell you which part of the brain controls which specific body functions. Empathy is part of this spirituality. ‘I feel your pain’ is not a metaphor or just words to console. It is literal. Some who turn to complementary medicine do so because they are treated as ‘spiritual being’. Advanced complementary therapist can even feel the patient’s emotions emphatically during the course of their treatment. This ability to monitor their patient’s feelings effectively helps them in their treatment.
Edward Wong mentions that Jefferson Medical School in Philadelphia had created an ‘empathy index’ to measure the physician’s effectiveness in dealing with their patients. Incorporating spirituality and developing empathy index is not clinical medicine going backwards but it is to be considered progressive and an advancement in medical care that is holistic. Patients will tell you that they prefer to be treated as human beings with feelings rather than machines to be repaired. Waiting 2 to 4 hours in the hospital to see a doctor (which is what I am doing now as I write this letter) only to be abruptly asked a few diagnostic questions and bundle out in 5-10 minutes without a word of assurance does nothing to the emotionally anxious patient. It instead leaves a sense of being ignored, deprived and ‘miss-treated’. Yes the doctor has all the medical knowledge but it is the patient who is experiencing all the pain. Their complaints should not be dismissed as a waste of time and ignored but should be considered as part of their clinical symptoms which will help in their diagnosis. If doctors wonder why patients turn to alternative and complementary medicine I advise them to just ‘listen to their patients’.
I refer to MBA’s emotive letter in ‘Try lending patients an ear, too, doctor’ and Edward Wong’s informative supporting letter. Edward had helpfully highlighted that 50 medical schools in US had incorporated the subject of ‘spirituality’ into their courses. This is probably due to the dawning realisation that man is not just a biological machine but also a ‘spiritual being’. We possess conscience and emotions which until today medical science had not been able to locate its existence in the biological brain even though they can tell you which part of the brain controls which specific body functions. Empathy is part of this spirituality. ‘I feel your pain’ is not a metaphor or just words to console. It is literal. Some who turn to complementary medicine do so because they are treated as ‘spiritual being’. Advanced complementary therapist can even feel the patient’s emotions emphatically during the course of their treatment. This ability to monitor their patient’s feelings effectively helps them in their treatment.
Edward Wong mentions that Jefferson Medical School in Philadelphia had created an ‘empathy index’ to measure the physician’s effectiveness in dealing with their patients. Incorporating spirituality and developing empathy index is not clinical medicine going backwards but it is to be considered progressive and an advancement in medical care that is holistic. Patients will tell you that they prefer to be treated as human beings with feelings rather than machines to be repaired. Waiting 2 to 4 hours in the hospital to see a doctor (which is what I am doing now as I write this letter) only to be abruptly asked a few diagnostic questions and bundle out in 5-10 minutes without a word of assurance does nothing to the emotionally anxious patient. It instead leaves a sense of being ignored, deprived and ‘miss-treated’. Yes the doctor has all the medical knowledge but it is the patient who is experiencing all the pain. Their complaints should not be dismissed as a waste of time and ignored but should be considered as part of their clinical symptoms which will help in their diagnosis. If doctors wonder why patients turn to alternative and complementary medicine I advise them to just ‘listen to their patients’.
Isaac Lim
Emotional Freedom for All -PJ
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