Sometimes catharsis seems to be the only way to placate an aggrieved mind that doesn’t want to come to terms with the harsh reality and doctors are destined to go through situations as described by Dr. Bhatt, where he could not move a mountain of obstacles to rise up to the call of his conscience. Yet, my mind says that when there is will there is way. My Own Experience The most analogous situation to the one described by Dr. Bhatt I have faced in my internship involved a female patient with burn injury, who ran out of her funds, as she was not covered by medical insurance and seemed was not in a condition to pay her dues afterwards too.
While it seemed important to keep her for a couple of days under observation and more importantly to save her from infection, the hospital rules didn’t permit to keep a patient for free for more than five days. However, I met the Chief Medical Officer of my hospital and apprised him of the situation with a detailed report duly signed and containing clear medical advice of keeping her in isolation for two weeks to save her life.
The humane angle presented in that report had convinced the CMO too and subsequently I succeeded to accommodate the patient for another two weeks for free, at the end of which she recovered fully from her injury and returned home free from the fear of infection. While it is true that healthcare sector is another service sector where its members earn their livelihood from it, it is also true that it faces problems on humanitarian grounds more often than not – where in some cases doctors feel helpless before the regulations regarding financial transactions and its implication on healthcare service.
From this perspective I was fortunate to find a sympathetic person in my CMO, who gave me a patient hearing and realized the gravity of the situation. Conclusion Unfortunately, what I felt missing in the account of Dr. Bhatt was courage and strength of his character. Instead of meekly submitting to the situation, he could have risen to the occasion by confronting the clerk. Had I been in his place, I would have gone for that at the first instance, armed with Hippocratic oath. No hospital except the makeshift ones on the war front can run out of space to such an extent that it can’t accommodate a rickety boy in any of its corner.
Even if that were true, I would have kept the boy in the doctors’ restroom as a mark of symbolic protest, or as the last resort, would have put in the boy in anyone’s home till a bed could be arranged for him in the hospital. Thus I don’t feel moved with the account of nostalgia of Dr. Bhat. Instead, the essence what I have derived from the account of Dr. Bhatt is that, a doctor’s courage and conviction can turn the situation in favor of the patient, besides satiating doctor’s own spiritual appetite. Ends