I don’t like having to go to the doctor. For one, it means I’m sick, and no one likes being sick. For another, it is expensive. Most importantly, I do not like to be on the watch so as not to inadvertently bruise their precious ego.
In my growing-up years there was a doctor in the family and this ‘doctor uncle’ saw us through all our ailments, large and small, real and imaginary. I later moved to another country for a considerable number of years. My real exposure to doctors happened there. During this stint abroad, I saw my share of doctors, from general practitioners to dermatologists, obstetrician-gynecologists, paediatricians, orthopaedists, rheumatologists, gastroenterologists, ophthalmologists and surgeons, either for myself or for the rest of the family. These doctors came in different sizes, shapes, genders, races and personalities. Adjusting for the latter, invariably all of them were polite, affable, showed concern in their demeanour, put one at ease and worked to gain one’s trust. I never got a feeling I was not their equal.
Now back in India, the doctor uncle has passed away and, reality check — I find most of the doctors here touchy. They do not fully listen to your medical history, are dismissive of any questions you might have, talk in rhetorical terms, and do not hesitate to practise their wit and sarcasm on you. Oftentimes, a simple question or remark gets misconstrued as an affront. In short, their customer service is ‘poor’. All this, when you are charged hefty consultation fees, made to wait for hours in their lobby and then dismissed unceremoniously in a couple of minutes.
Once in the days leading up to my aged father’s surgery I voiced my concern to a senior surgeon about my father’s chronic hyper-sugar levels and its potential effects on the outcome of the surgery. All I expected was some kind of acknowledgement of my fears and a few words of reassurance from him. Instead, what I got was a cold shoulder and a strict admonition to the nurse in attendance to ‘handle’ me.
As the doctor stormed out of the room with the nurse trailing him, I was left in shock, wondering what had just happened. When the nurse returned, it was only to share with me that even they — the nurses — were afraid to talk to him. A regular Soup Nazi, I realised. I was left to remember wistfully the good old days outside the country when doctors actually held conversations with nurses and whole-heartedly included you too in the banter. There, the doctors neither assumed they were super-human nor were you made to feel subhuman.
Another time, upon trying to clarify something with a doctor, I had him advise me to ‘learn how to speak to a doctor’.
To my naive belief, a doctor’s job is to hear out my issues and heal me to the best of his/her knowledge and ability. In return I would treat him just as courteously and politely as I would treat, say, my manager at work or the janitor at my apartment. I had not known there was any right way to speak to a doctor. I have seen my relatives and friends, working professionals in no way any less in the social ladder, kow-towing to these doctors. But I fail to understand why it should be so.
In my eyes, the only difference between me and doctors is that they are trained to treat an illness while I lack that knowledge. All the more reason for them to be empathetic when dealing with sick people and their concerned family members. Years of medical practice, instead of filling them with humility for being capable of healing fellow humans — the ultimate vocation a person can have — fills their heads with a sense of self-importance. Don’t these professionals realise that the Hippocratic Oath of non-maleficence also ensures the well-being of their patients by not hurting them psychologically at whim?
The picture is not all black, though: there are bright spots too. For instance, my kids’ paediatrician, a very senior man, retains his sense of humour, empathises with worried mothers, prompts parents for anything they might have missed to mention in their narrative, even hands out his personal contact number, that he never fails to pick up in his waking hours.
And then there’s my very busy ophthalmologist, who still finds it in him to small-talk about common concerns such as politics and child-rearing.
But such doctors are indeed a rare breed, while a majority of them seem to be spoilt and ready to throw a tantrum at the slightest perceived offence to their fragile ego. I understand that doctors deal with a huge number of patients on a day-to-day basis and are hard-pressed for time. But that is absolutely no excuse for downright rudeness.
A little empathy and a humane face to go with it — is that too much to ask for? Will these self-proclaimed gods ever descend to lowly Earth, which the rest of us inhabit?
anandhi252@gmail.com
