Good Doctors

Having worked in a hospital setting before medical school, going back to a classroom for pre-clerkship was a bit disheartening. Not only was I away from patients, but my interactions with physicians were rather impersonal and very academically-oriented. There wasn't much opportunity to physicians, well, being physicians. It made me fairly cynical, more cynical than I thought I was getting. When the best a physician could be to me was an adequate instructor in a course that at many times carried only a passing relevance to my eventual career, it became very easy to get judgmental or frustrated with the quality of the physicians - they didn't feel like physicians because they weren't acting like physicians.

Being in clerkship, getting to spend time with physicians and residents while they interact with their patients, and with each other, has really removed a lot of that cynicism. There are some really good doctors out there. Some REALLY good doctors.

Don't get me wrong, I'm also seeing a lot of parts of medicine - and of individual physicians - that I'm less than impressed by, but there have been more than a few instances of the past week and a half that have really put things in perspective. Medicine is difficult and nuanced, but seeing a master at work is like watching an Olympic gymnast do a crazy routine and stick the landing. It's baffling and gorgeous all at the same time. And an encouraging goal to aspire to.