Over the last couple months, I have
often been asked what I plan to do
as a recent college graduate. My
response has been that I will be
attending medical school in Chicago.

“Oh! Medical school!” many exclaim
as their eyes light up, “So you’re
going to be a rich doctor.”

This response as well as most others
I have received seemed to imply that
medicine is an ideal profession if
one is gifted enough to pursue it.
Medicine has had the luxury of being
one of the great professions within
societies throughout history, along
with practitioners in areas such as
law and religion. Though some may
argue that modernism has
significantly transformed these
historic societal roles, there is still a
great deal of respect and prestige
commanded by these positions.
Perhaps my view is a bit
romanticized, but I think there is
value in viewing our future
physicians as being called to the
medical field to share their talents
and abilities rather than being gifted
enough to pursue professional
prestige and a high salary.

This distinction seems particularly
important for professions which deal
in the treatment of people. To heal a
person, whether it be his body or
soul, requires both additional
humility and more carefully defined
goals.

The former is well reflected in
the old adage, “With great power
comes great responsibility.” Work
which affects the lives of other
human beings carries with it
additional moral and ethical weight.

The second requirement is a result
of the former. If a car is broken, for
example, it is usually easy to identify
one’s options and the implications of
such decisions. This is not the case
for a human being with a diverse
array of needs from physiological to
psycho-social.
Thus these
professions require careful
deliberations to determine
appropriate goals and limits, and
without those goals and limits, there
is a greater risk for a lack of
congruency, leading to
disagreements about the correct
place of such professions in a given
society.

Approaching a field such as
medicine as a simple choice may
undermine the humility it requires
and further complicate our attempts
to define its goals and limits.
Studies continue to suggest that a
substantial percent of physicians are
dissatisfied with their profession
due to pay and a growing gap
between professional and personal
expectations. I think physicians and
their patients may be expecting
infallible medical professionals who
operate independently and achieve
financial benefits, whereas modern
medical practice continues to
demand collaboration and greater
humility.

If I felt that I chose medicine to
achieve some personal gain, I would
be more likely to expect personal
benefits which outweigh my
sacrifices. Approaching the medical
field as a calling shifts one’s focus to
the positive impact one can make in
his/her community, which may add
both to the satisfaction of medical
practitioners as well as their
patients.

Before the remarkable technological
growth of the last century, the
medical field was limited in its
power. Today nearly every known
condition has a course of treatment,
many with high rates of success.

This newly obtained power has
sparked a number of debates over
the last few decades about the
proper limits and goals of medicine.

It is curious to me that
conversations surrounding
healthcare reform seem primarily
concerned with money. It seems that
for many economic concerns define
the proper place of medicine and we
must simply balance affordability
and access with innovation.

This cannot be right. Surely we
would like to believe that our
physicians sincerely care about our
well-being and are not simply trying
to maximize their profits by
balancing our demand for ‘caring’
with their supply. For this and many
other reasons, medicine is unique
and economics alone will not provide
us with the insight we desire. Rather
than struggling to answer each
ethical dilemma facing modern
medicine individually when they
arise, I think significant insight can
be gained by attempting to trace
these dilemmas back to their source
and then posing more global
questions.

To do so, let us compare the field of
medicine to religious institutions.

When a young man decides to
become a priest, for example, we
expect that he felt called to such a
life. Yes, he likely could have
pursued different professions, but
he felt a pull, perhaps even a duty,
to become a priest. When his
parishioners seek his counsel, we
would expect him to be humble to
the power of his position and to
provide guidance which would best
serve the souls of those individuals,
according to their common beliefs.

The limits and goals of his
profession are clearly defined by the
doctrines of his religious institution.
Although he serves his parishioners,
he is not expected to tell these
individuals what they want to hear
so much as what they need to hear
according to the teachings of their
church. Medicine shares similar
requirements for humility and clearly
defined goals, yet we tend to
approach this field quite differently.

Perhaps there is something to be
gained by asking ourselves to what
set of rules and principles should our
future physicians answer? I would
suggest that physicians should be
servants of health and that health
be the goal and limit of medicine. Of
course defining health in a given
society is no easy task; but if such a
definition was achieved and
universally accepted, I believe
patients’ and physicians’
expectations may converge through
this understanding, facilitating
better patient-physician
relationships and overall healthcare.

Much like the priest and his
parishioners, patients may instead
trust their physicians as servants of
their health rather than prestigious
professionals hoping to make a lot
of money or powerful crusaders
against death. Physicians may also
face less ambiguity and greater
satisfaction serving the health of
his/her community rather than
striving to achieve a return for their
investment. Furthermore we may
find ourselves agreeing on more of
the tough, ethical dilemmas facing
modern medicine.

Thus I conclude not with a magic
answer but set of broader questions
and a calling to physicians and
patients alike to work towards a
better understanding of health in
our society.

Nice writeup

Summary pls

And you forgot

SOURCE:myschool.com.ng

Joshuadon:
Summary pls
And you forgot
SOURCE:myschool.com.ng

dats erroneous
diz iz d link

http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2013/06/medicine-choice-calling.html