Transparency in Medicine

Transparency

1. free from pretense or deceit
2. easily detected or seen through
3. readily understood
4. characterized by visibility or accessibility of information especially concerning business practices

----------------

I am regularly struck by how much research patients often do before coming to the doctor. The Internet provides a full gateway of information and, unfortunately, misinformation about diseases, treatments and the system of medical practice. The Internet has been an effort to provide greater transparency in how we practice medicine and deliver healthcare. The written word seems to hold great validity to patients.

Transparency is fundamental to the creating of trusting, nurturing relationships with each other, particularly between clinician and patient. If for a moment the patient believes that communication and information provided is full of pretense, lies, or is not understood, there is immediate breakdown of the relationship and (if medical social scientists are correct) the cooperation of the patient in his/her care or "compliance". So the real question, is there transparency in medicine?

The reality is that transparency is scary to clinicians and the system as a whole. There are elaborate efforts to fully but not completely, reveal the secrets of medicine and medical practice. The Internet has done major things to this "gap" but rely on patient understanding, so would seem to violate "readily understood" transparency. Has the Internet then helped or hurt?

Transparency in the system is really up to the clinician. It's not the patient role or within his/her ability to force transparency through the Internet or available information sources. While it's all "out there", it may not be all understood and may actually contribute to damaging the relationship between physician and patient as they often believe what they read over what is being said.

So in that lies the greatest opportunities for improving patient care, trust and compliance...creating transparency with each patient we encounter. Yet there are risks in doing so as magnified by the legal system. However, taking risk offers great rewards. We should embrace our fear with honesty and transparency.  But that would be in the perfect world with tort reform, liability caps and a system that supports that perspective. I'm not optimistic.

Another surgeon quit working this week. Tired of dealing with being questioned by everyone about how he practices. Another good surgeon, out to pasture.

Service

One of the unsung, unmentioned perks of medical education is the access to quality experiences of service. These opportunities come in small packages, like tiny and discreet words with patients or families. And they come in larger packages related to hearing about real community needs. I had the chance for a sort of large one, more medium in scope, but VERY LARGE in effect. I helped a family clean out an apartment of a family member who died from suicide after a long, long battle with cancer, drug abuse, alcoholism, cirrhosis, pancreatitis, heart failure, kidney failure and emphysema. The physical, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual benefit of this day long effort was tremendous.

But one of the most striking elements of this event was the short list for "shopping" the deceased had created before his death. He simply wrote on a small, pink Post-it note: "comet cleaner, scrips, beef w/barley."

I've been trying to wrap my head about around the whole experience and the grateful family for stepping up when few others did except to come salvage personal belongings of the deceased.

Cleaner, drugs and soup seems to punctuate the simplicity, commonality and routine of a life in great pain, alone, struggling in the end to find a reason to live, clean the apartment and eat, until it became why bother.

Surgerizing

I am REALLY in my element.

A chance to cut is a chance to cure.

But the pathology is so, so devastating.

I am so blessed to be whole, and not have someone leaning over me wielding a scalpel.

Really looking forward to Easter weekend and the last days of Passover week. A great time to pause and give thanks.

How to Value Medical Students

Teaching is more than a business in medicine. Medical students, interns, residents and fellows have real needs. We all do. Address the needs and you make a friend for life and influence the future of medicine in a meaningful way. Such are the qualities of good clinical preceptors, teachers of medicine and surgery. I've had some good ones.

So what needs did he or she address? Certainty, variety, significance, connection, growth and contribution.

Learners want to know what's expected of them (certainty), experience a cross section of pathology (variety), feel they are important (significance), be a part of the team and treated as such (connection), learning (growing) and feel as if they have helped in a meaningful way (contribution).

It's hard to teach the importance of basic human needs to teachers,... individuals who are often struggling to have their own needs met.

Patient - Clinician Relationship

I have met some really good clinicians lately; Individual who create great environments of trust, communication and cooperative healing with patients.

It's really pretty simple. There is ALWAYS a gap between what we expect of our patients, and how they act. I've noticed that the most disturbed clinicians assume the worst about that gap. Positive, happy clinicians seem to believe the best, come to the defense of their patients, speak directly to the patient (and not in the hallway to others) about those gaps, and create REAL trust with the patient so he doesn't feel judged or persecuted when they come to visit.

"Do unto others (patients) as you would have them do unto you (if they were the doc)"...We should protect, trust, hope and persevere more.

It really is pretty simple and probably applicable to the rest of our relationships, even outside of work.

Still Engaged

Whenever I engage solo or groups of physicians I really listen carefully to what they say about this profession. I try to discern what it is they do, how they feel about it and what they believe the future to be. I'm constantly reminded of how many physicians are unhappy with what they do and why. I hear complaints about patients, insurance companies, the government, systems, and on and on. I'm convinced that there are more unhappy people in medicine than any other profession, but I don't interact with any other profession (sampling bias).

So the other day I met a very interesting surgeon, visiting the area. He practices in a small country in Africa and is the chief of surgery in a large (by African standards) teaching hospital. Listening to him speak you would have thought he had been given the gift of levitation. The pride and happiness almost oozed from his pores. It was a refreshing view into the life of a physician who really was happy with life and wholly feeling the "honor" of being a healer in a country desperately in need of healing on many levels.

One thing I'm certain of. I'm happy as a little clam. I love the content, the work, the patients, the material, the environment and the comrades. I'm learning to ignore the bitching and see past the complaining to the value in what we do and how we effect others. It's refreshing. Just hope I can maintain it thru this amazingly retarded system they call medical education.

And the surgeon, he invited me to do a "rotation" in Africa. Why not? I don't think Medicare is a discussion point there.

And exactly how do we know little clams are happy?

Don't Eat the Eggs

Two days of lecture have me whipped. Sitting is becoming my least favorite activity in the mode of learning. Learning by doing (preferably walking, running or actively moving in some anatomical way) is my preferred. But the content was good and a reminder of how much I have to study before my next big exams. I need those subtle raps in the head occasionally. But what I didn't need was the rap to the GI tract. Note to self: Don't eat the eggs at a medical conference.