The first time I met my patient, every sense of nervousness I had previously felt completely vanished. I was no longer focused on how I felt at all, the only person\u2019s emotions I was considering and focusing on were my patient\u2019s. I immediately wanted to comfort her by understanding how and what she might have been feeling at that moment. So, I started the best way I knew how. I smiled at her. I looked into her eyes and smiled as if I could convey all of my compassion and comforting presence to her through a look. I wanted her to know that I was there for her. I was there to be a listening ear and a comforting presence even if that meant we simply sat together in silence. And I could tell she was a bit tired and not really in the mood to socialize, but I stayed for a while longer and we looked through a photo album of hers together. It was so nice to see her smile and recognize her loved ones and recollect and reflect on the fun times they’d had together. I say this to say that although we didn\u2019t converse for a long time during our visit, I was very happy with the fact that I was able to experience some joy with her as we walked through memory lane for a while. It made me feel like I was able to provide a comfortable emotional experience that uplifted her tired state that she\u2019d had before our visit.<\/p>\n
When I first began as a hospice volunteer, despite being thrilled to be a provider of compassion for patients and get a firsthand experience in patient care, I also felt quite nervous because I hadn\u2019t had any previous experience in the healthcare field. I was worried that I wouldn\u2019t be able to put my patient at ease if and when they\u2019d ever felt uneasy during this time given that it can be very emotional. I consider myself to be a very empathetic person and I was a little worried that that would get in the way of me providing the best companionship I could for my patient. However, it did not. Given this, I actually started to recognize the whole reason I became a volunteer in the first place: to strengthen my personal and professional qualities that I believe will someday contribute to making me an incredible physician. I believe that being a (good) doctor is about more than just \u201chealing\u201d patients\u2019 illnesses. It is about caring for them medically, physically, and emotionally as well. This includes being able to empathize with them and being mindful of how their conditions are affecting them holistically. I recall watching the Being Mortal<\/em> video that was assigned to me in the beginning of this process and something that resonated with me was how Dr. Gawande discussed how difficult it is as a physician to \u201cdeal with the two unfixables\u201d which are aging and dying. And the experience of being a hospice volunteer has opened up my mind to this fact and has been able to bring this perspective into reality for me a great deal. Before meeting my patient, I tried to make myself very hyper-aware of their situation as being a patient in hospice. I tried to prepare myself to be emotionally present in such a way that allowed them to know and understand that I would be there to provide them with the best companionship possible. But at the same time, I felt like I had to build a barrier for my emotions so as to not become too emotionally involved. The experience of being a hospice volunteer and the quality time I have been able to spend with my patient has really enhanced how much I, not just as an aspiring doctor, but as a person, value emotional connection(s) because of how meaningful it can be not only to me but to the people I interact with, namely patients who in this case are receiving end-of-life care which understandably is different for every patient. For some it can be a very difficult thing to accept, for others it may not be as difficult, but no matter the difficulty I think the presence both physically and emotionally of another human being whose intentions are to care for you to the best of their ability and assure you that you are not alone, is a task that words alone cannot begin to explain. Which is what makes me genuinely value the aspiration of becoming a physician. If we as humans and as people are not compassionate and empathetic, then we hold no true value for life itself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The first time I met my patient, every sense of nervousness I had previously felt completely vanished. I was no longer focused on how I felt at all, the only person\u2019s emotions I was considering and focusing on were my patient\u2019s. I immediately wanted to comfort her by understanding how and what she might have … Continue reading “There is More to Healthcare Than Medicine”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"school":[60],"program_year":[56],"class_list":["post-2635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hospice","school-muhlenberg","program_year-56"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2635"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2635\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2784,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2635\/revisions\/2784"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2635"},{"taxonomy":"school","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/school?post=2635"},{"taxonomy":"program_year","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.athenainstitute.com\/ahp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/program_year?post=2635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}