Where are the Game-Changers?

The other day I was watching a documentary on CNN which showed the queasiness of human life with a close perspective. Malnourished kids living in over crowded and unhygienic mud huts; lack of adequate drinking water and whatever was available, I believe, contained virulent strains of E Coli. This scene belonged to interiors of Bihar and I was, literally, taken aback at the apathy that the society bears to them. I include myself in the list of culprits. I took few resolutions to make a change in those precious lives which have been turned redundant by the sharp turn of fate.

How beautiful the world had been if before uncorking a packaged bottle of drinking water, we could have stopped for a millisecond and thought about those fragile females who have to walk for miles to fetch a bucket of water from the contaminated well.

How beautiful the world had been, if in spite of wasting hundreds of hours over watching mindless daily soaps, some of us would have determined to devote that amount of time doing social service.

How beautiful the world had been if we stopped for a millisecond before feeding the leftover to our kitchen bin, and thought about millions who had to sleep hungry last night.

Cricket and cinema make us go brouhaha; why don’t we face life? Why the suicide of a farmer doesn’t affect us deeply? Why don’t we get moved watching little kids glancing at the garbage to find out something to eat? Why should we spend on 5 star meals if some of our people are a rupee short of purchasing a paracetamol tablet? We pay income taxes to the government; why shouldn’t we be taken in confidence while making budgets and executing policies? Is the current system the best one? Where are the policy-formulators, the revolutionists, the game-changers?

10 Random things that Doctors hate.

You discover that home made sweets are being smuggled in for the patient by the attendants, in spite of the fact that the patient is a known diabetic and admitted with Ketoacidosis.

Your patient is in evident septicemia and in spite of your best intuition & clinical wisdom, you don’t really get the cultures positive.

That X Ray Chest film is in rotation again.

You smell that the I/O (Intake/Output) chart is crooked by some of the lazy staff on duty.

The old gentleman in the ICU got very sick again and no attendants are being traceable. Even the provided cell numbers are in sleeping mode (read switched off).

A hematological test, carried out at ABC lab, provides an unexpectedly bizarre value. You want to be reconfirmed so this time you send a fresh sample to another high profile lab, let’s say XYZ. To your amazement and mounting frustration, this time again the values are bizarre, just on the opposite pole.

A chronically non-compliant patient gets admitted in a bad shape. He holds a history of being treated for pulmonary tuberculosis on a number of occasions at different places; and to make the matters worse, he never really finished the treatment as per his doctors’ advices. This time he is diagnosed to be having MDR (Multi Drug Resistant Tuberculosis). You feel bad.

You have just 30 minutes of your OPD Consultation time left for the day and 18 patients are scheduled in the waiting list.

Your JR signed of the discharge slip without taking heed of the fact that Tab Crocin can’t be taken 2 tea-spoons full.

One of the attendants tries to judge your clinical and academic knowledge by making his internet-acquired-medical-knowledge the standards of excellence.