She told me that she was not enjoying the program and was considering other career options. She didn't have the enthusiasm and interest that she thought she might have before and if this persists at the end of next year, I will be declining my internship offer.
Yes, the obvious causes speak for themselves: exhausting hours, draining work and exposure to people going through a difficult journey through the hospital system, which is an emotional stress to all people who have some level of compassion and empathy. My friend definitely does.
However, after having enough time to think about it, I am quite pissed off about her attitude. I am well aware that my views are controversial and there are no intentions to offend.
Frankly speaking, the Australian Public has invested in her education through loaning money to pay her tuition in Medicine & Surgery. The hundreds of patients that have dedicated their time and through their discomfort, pain and processes of illness and or death, devoted energy to explain their history, allowed for clinical examination and provided consent to share de-identified information to other colleagues to improve perspective, knowledge and experience deserve more from a person who has signed an agreement dedicating themselves to the public.
And so with all this education she has received from the generous ill, she considers not devoting but a year of her life after the program to serve the community because of personal interests. Now like I said, I do not know her personal situation; but I do know that we all have mountains to climb, obstacles to negotiate and I sure as hell, as well as my good friends among the readers of this blog, have suffered tremendously and persisted through the program. We took the psychological damage, physical fatigue and deprivation of normal life.
So a colleague of mine, a person who is sound in academia, compassion and care has decided to consider abandoning those who helped her become who she is. In my view, I do not see how I can support such a view, especially because the purpose of abandonment is selfishness.
First and foremost comes the patient, and then comes personal well-being. This personal well-being must be facilitated to serve the patient and ensure that we ourselves do not get lost in the fog of clinical war with disease. It is an eternal war and we must not give up on patients and having said that, walking away from those who expect care is unthinkable.
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| Left Alone, Ne'er to Grow... Abandoned. |
That's the second time I've come across anger towards people who "drop out" of their medical career. Previously, it was a fourth year student berating a mutual colleague who left medicine for dentistry because she realised she'd made the wrong choice. I was personally offended by the way this foreign student ranted about people who "waste" places in the degree.
ReplyDeleteI don't think it's ideal for people to be walking away from this. Firstly, there's the effort they themselves have put in to get this far - the first degree, the GAMSAT, the MMI, surviving medicine up to this point. It is a shame for that to have been misdirected, to have been for nothing.
The issue of Commonwealth support... I get your point, BUT... the "sick" do not exclusively fund people learning to be doctors. The working population of Australia fund many things: students of medicine, teaching, nursing, law, science, arts, economics etc.; actual hospitals; roads; schools... It's not like when I pay my tax this month I can put a sticky note on a $50 bill saying "Dear Julia, Please earmark this for a medical student..." So honestly, I don't think this argument holds any water. If you want to talk about the wasted tax dollars of the sick - talk about the state of our hospitals, the shortage of beds and nurses, the fact that a man died in Brewarinna hospital because they don't have equipment as simple as a blanket warmer. And while you are at it, please berate every other student who has ever dropped out of any degree. At least this individual we're discussing is a highly intelligent, highly functioning person who is easily employable in any sector.
There is another of our mutual colleagues, R, who dropped out earlier this year, or at least has deferred a year but is quite unsure of his return. He looked around the year group at the enthusiasm with which others were budding into doctors, and realised he didn't have it. He worked hard, he is one of the most compassionate people I have ever met. If I had to pick someone and say "you get to be the doctor" it would be him. But he realised he didn't even know why he was studying medicine, he didn't feel the enthusiasm, he couldn't see a future in it. His words to me were, "It's unfair to myself, and to you, my colleagues, but most of all to the patient, if I continue this at this point in time." All you are seeing is how selfish these people are - but they are not. Is it fair to the patient to have doctors who don't really want to be doing this job? Is that safe and ethical practice? Is it fair for you to work with medicos who don't share your enthusiasm?
And even if this is "selfish"... is it fair to force someone into a career they don't want, in which they may not be happy, just because when they were younger they mistakenly thought they did? You may be perfect, but the rest of us sure aren't. Apologies if we don't live up to your expectations. I know, it's disappointing. Maybe you should get used to that.
I think it's a bit disproportionate for you to be 'pissed' at your friend, and to be honest, your post comes off as very judgemental towards her. You don't really know that her motivations are selfish - there might be other, compelling factors that she's chosen not to talk about with you - and even if it's just "selfish", how is it your place to judge her? I can guarantee that not that much of your taxes have been spent on her education, and if your friend is the kind of caring and compassionate person you describe, she won't have imposed undue pain or stress on the patients she's seen - if they're really that unwell, med students don't see them.
ReplyDeleteYou're also assuming that the only way she can 'give back' to the community is to enter into clinical practice - I imagine, from what you've said of her, that she'd be making a valuable contribution if she chose to go into medical research or a similar field.
A lot of people try to romanticise medicine into a 'calling' etc, and feel that we should sacrifice everything else for the privilege of being doctors - but the reality is that at the end of a long shift, it's just another job, albeit one with fairly unique stressors. If your friend has decided that it's not for her, then isn't it better for the patients to have a doctor taking care of them who is more interested and enthusiastic? It's not like internships are going unfilled these days. This 'first and foremost comes the patient' attitude is something that contributes to physician burn-out and even suicides - because people don't want to admit that they can't do that anymore, and it reaches a breaking point. I would argue that we can't take good care of our patients, unless we first take care of ourselves.
I hope that your friend is able to find her motivation and interest in medicine again, because she, too, has invested a lot in this path. A lot more than you've invested in her journey, or the taxpayer, or the patients she's seen, for that matter. Turning her back on it would be a big decision, and I doubt it'd be one she'd take lightly. I wish her the best either way.
Just my 2c.