I slept late at night, following a small party with the usual razzmatazz. I had barely doused in my much awaited slumber when my cellphone rang, showing an unknown number. There was a desperate person speaking in local dialect.
‘Is it Dr.Anuj?’
‘Yes, it’s me’
‘doctor sahab, my daughter’s hand his crushed in the table fan, she is bleeding, can i come to you right now?’
The man was howling and i could feel the uncontrollable turmoil he was envisaging at that moment.
I looked at the watch, it was 2:30 ÀM.
My eyes were soggy and head groggy because of the dose of my favourite single malt in the party. I looked at the lady by my side, my wife of course, who was also fidgety for being disturbed in the wee hours of her sleep.
I took exactly ten seconds to decide and asked the desperate father to bring his ailing daughter to my centre.
‘doctor sahab, i will take almost 45minutes to reach your centre.’
Well, did i have an option??… NO
I had to get up, change to my hospital overall and go to my centre, which is thankfully in my premises only, and wake my lazy night staff to do the preparation for the emergency.
My adorable and much needed sleep was ostracized and sacrificed at the alter of my profession, and instead of feeling the warmth of the quilt and the lady beside, i was sitting in my chamber’s chair shaking my leg and spinning my head.
Did I do all this to make money????
NO… certainly not.
No money in the world could buy my sleep, that I desperately needed at that hour. I would not trade it for any wealth or happiness or gain… oh, how much i wanted to be in bed.
But there was only one thing that made me sit in the chair through those frustrating minutes and hold me awake… that was HUMANITY.
The cry of the weeping father and the dropping tears of his daughter made me fight my pleasures and get buckled up for the Hand surgery and Microsurgery that i was supposed to perform on that ailing patient…
I am the healer. People fall on my feat when I join their amputated hands to function. I cannot trade that internal happiness with any money in the universe…
I certainly don’t do all this for money… yes, money is important, but only to take care of my daily chores and family commitments and assignments…
Why don’t i switch off my phone before going to bed, like all people do, and cut off myself from the cries and miseries of the world. Don’t I deserve sleep as a common man does, after a hectic painful day???
It is widely and rightly prophesized that don’t sleep on your cellphone as its radiation are harmful to health…
Well, aint we Doctors, human beings??? why do we take so much of risk…?
It is because we have to be available for any mishap or trouble with anyone, anytime, anywhere.
After almost one hour of a long wait, the patient finally arrived. The girl was barely six years old.. Her tears had dried up and she was just sobbing in the lap of her father.
It took me almost two hours to fix her partially cut three fingers. It was six in the morning when I came out of the operation theatre and asked for a cup of tea from my domestic help.
I asked the father of the girl to deposit my fee. Before surgery the father told me that someone was bringing the money. I was in no mood to waste time for money as the cut fingers were devoid of blood and needed urgent microsurgical procedure.
The father of the patient looked at me with almost distrust and anger when he heard the fee, which was very nominal to me, but was too much for him.
‘You are cheating me and charging exorbitantly for the minor stitches that you have given’… the man ended up paying just twenty five percent of my fee that too with lot of ‘ehsaan’ and sarcasm and deceit.
Did i have a choice? Will any other business or profession give the comfort of paying according to your will???
I am certainly not a hooligan to fight and expect my payments with power of my fist.
I let the man walk out with his daughter, without grumbling or showing displeasure.
With me and I am sure with all the doctors, the things may be the same… we deal in emergency and at that time, money has no role… the attendants also rush to the hospital. with empty pockets… no body has money sitting at home for emergency situations like this.. do we ????….anyhow, the corporate set ups may have different versions to this.
We all are here to make a living and we want a decent living, providing the best to our family with some savings for ‘our’, emergency situations.
We, the Doctors, are put in a class and a pedestal which is close to God… our Hippocratic Oath also prophesizes sermons, making us do things that are above the reach of common man.
I do..and I know that we all doctors do our best in treating the suffering patient.
But, we are also humans and not immuned to unenvisaged complications and errors…
I don’t say that there is fairness everywhere. But please do not club all in the same category and spin the rod with same gusto.
I have spent several sleepless nights with the tension and anxiety, not knowing the outcome of the microsurgical procedure i have performed in the day. I get equally concerned and wakeful for the positive results, as the patient or the attendants. It is not the question of money or reputation. It is the concern and my own challenge to myself, where my dexterity and expertise is in question.
I have virtually shed tears when once I put my entire strength and could not save the hand of a fourteen years old girl that got chopped off in a fodder cutting machine.
Doctors are sensitive breed and without the ornate of passion, we cannot connect with the ailments and the sufferer.
We are stable and not emotionally labile, while doing our work. My hands did not shake when I was putting stitches on the split forehead of my darling baby daughter.
We need the faith and total submission from our patients. Patients who come to us with total faith and belief, get the best from us and go smiling.
There is another flip-side..Patients who don’t trust and consult several other doctors to quench their quandary, end up getting less from us…
We all are on a journey..we wish to make your journey happy and peaceful, by being with you and hold you in our tight professional grip of expertise, when you stumble or suffer.
We are no God, or His messenger… don’t make us either… We are there to transfer energy to your body to make you fight the battle of your destiny.
We need your faith and love…..
