All hospitals have heart-treating cardio departments, but do they have hearts?

There was a time in Goa when the dotor was the medicine. Now many old-timers lament that they dip into their savings to spend on expensive medicines but the real treatment – the healing touch of a doctor, is missing. No settlement of bills in hospitals can buy the care that matters- concern and affection which was always the magic potion that healed.

Today’s modern technology-aided healthcare institutions have specialists for every limb, muscle and organ of your body like the brain and the heart. But do many of these facilities have hearts? And the reason why this is a valid question is because till today we still have noble men and women in the medical profession who fly the flag of nobility each day. There are honest hardworking professionals working in Primary Health Care centres small clinics, government hospitals and even in private health care who live upto to the cardinal principles of the profession- absolute transparency and utmost care. Their dedication cannot be sullied by blood-sucking non-professionals.

That is the difference between these and banana doctors who, as anecdotes go, used to diagnose that the source of one patient’s sickness was due to eating a banana, after noticing banana skins on the floor. It is this tribe of banana doctors, who muddy the pond of purity inhabited by the noble doctors.

The line between nobility & criminality blurs when patients become a target for fleecing

There is no argument against modern private health care with costs of treatments higher than government hospitals. Modern care is needed. But when hospitals as institutions become money-making machines, fleecing patients, deliberately extending their stays, not disclosing the full course of treatment needed ahead and prolonging the period of treatment across several admissions and visits to reach a “target” per patient, that is where the line between nobility and criminality blurs. Target-based medical marketing is not healthcare.

O Heraldo will bring on record stories of patients who have been fleeced in hospitals

O Heraldo has been flooded with messages and calls from patients wanting to tell how they have been fleeced and become victims of so-called care in hospitals. Their voices must be heard, their stories must be told. The more this is done the less are chances of your friend neighbour, or relative getting looted and “ill-treated”.

One has seen in movies stories of intravenous drips given to dead bodies in an “effort” to revive them. And a bill is presented at the end of that performance. Shockingly the difference between the reel incidents and real incidents vanishes in many cases.

O Heraldo encourages many of these narratives to be made public and promises to bring them on record so that these do not become hidden stories of suffering. This is to only ensure that the noble souls of this profession are isolated from looters and that people recognize the difference; not between private and government health care but between honest dedicated professionals and clever quacks and deceivers.

Earlier doctors in Goa were no different from family. They were more than doctors. They were healers

Doctors were healers not just of the body, but the mind and soul. The village doctor would often be called to drop in for a cup of tea and talk with a patient. Those moments of calm worked wonders. And there were “no specialists” From common cold, to high fever to delivery of babies, they did it all. Some even paid their patients to go and buy medicines.

And yes, when they passed away, the crowd that gathered at their funerals surpassed any film star or political leader. People gathered out of respect and gratitude and thanked their dotor who was a messenger of God.

Today in high-tech hospitals, you are a patient ID, not a name, with a barcode.

Everything is linked to your ID including all your future treatments for life. During the course of treatment, there is always a little extra attention paid to your “sum-assured” in your insurance policy. That is all-important.

While doctors are still thanked by family members at funerals, many perhaps do not deserve these accolades, whereas there are many doctors who work without any accolades dedicatedly and by sacrificing their own personal and family time. It is only important to understand this and see the difference between the two varieties.

There cannot be secrets between doctors and patients and or their close relatives. Because the patient has a right over his or her body and that includes the right to decide on a course of treatment procedure or not, expecting in return full disclosure.

It is only transparency and honesty that ensure no differences between patients, hospitals and doctors

When a patient says he or she has been wronged and shows a history of suffering, the needle of justice and sympathy must move towards him or her. A patient has neither the time, energy and often the money, to get into a prolonged battle or litigation with a hospital. A corporate hospital had departments to do this. If a patient says that he was kept completely in the dark about the possibility of complications after surgery, or kept in hospital for observation and presented a hefty bill, and casually informed that he would have to undergo one more surgery, will one believe the suffering patient or the PR machinery of a corporate hospital?

Finally, we all have to go one day including those who do so much wrong in the name of health care. Let those who betray this noble profession, in any capacity ask themselves. “Will we be able to look at ourselves before we leave this world and say we have dealt with fellow human beings, as God willed us to do?”