What should be the focus of health care? The disease or the patient and the family that stands by her? “Today, treatment is almost entirely focussed on diseases. Little attention is paid to the patients and their families. This must change,” says M.R. Rajagopal.
At a public reception accorded to him by Kshema Foundation on his having been honoured with the Padma Shri here on Friday, the medical practitioner who has blazed a new trail in palliative care in the State said, “In recent times, medicines are being administered on the ill, regardless of whether or not they would heal the patient of illness. When medicines fail to heal, the patients are left by the hospitals to face the inevitable. Then, palliative care units try to give them care and support.”
Harrowing experience
Dr. Rajagopal recounted how four of his team members from Pallium India had visited an old bedridden couple. The condition of the room was so nauseating that a team member had to rush out. Ants were crawling over the bare body of the woman. The team did not leave them to their plight. They cleaned the couple and the the room. Later, one member talked to the children of the old couple as well as members of the panchayat and ASHA workers. After consultation, they sent the couple to the care of a nurse at a distant place. “Here, it was not medicines that gave the healing touch, but humane handling of the situation,” he said.
Felicitating Dr. Rajagopal at the function and presenting him a memento, Tourism Minister Kadakampally Surendran said Dr. Rajagopal’s pioneering work in palliative care had done much to create awareness among lay persons and administrators about its crucial role in the healthcare system.
