In urging doctors to treat people with a human touch, Chief Minister N Biren was literally underlining the point that haughtiness and impoliteness should have no place on a doctor’s profile. It also stand that patients should reciprocate and respect the sanctity of the relationship that exists between the doctor and his or her patients and it is this which can give meaning to the universal understanding of health care. The care should not be mechanical but should come with a dosage of humaneness and it is perhaps this that distinguishes the relationship between a doctor and his patient and the relationship between a lawyer and his client or between an architect and his client. This is what sets apart the profession of treating and looking after the health of a patient.
That Chief Minister N Biren took the trouble of underlining this point while launching the Pradhan Mantri National Dialysis Programme at the mini auditorium of JNIMS on June 19 should give all a fair idea of where the relationship between a doctor and his patient stands in reality. It is here that it become imperative for all to come to the point that keeping any relationship alive and healthy cannot be a one way traffic and in as much as it is important for doctors to treat their patients with a human touch, it is also equally important for the patient and the patient party to realise that they also have a responsibility to reciprocate positively. This is important in the face of some ugly incidents in the past inside the sanctum sanctorum of a place such as a hospital.
It also stands that no one expects doctors to be miracle workers. What however is expected by all, is for the doctor to explain the ailment in as easy as it is possible for the layman to understand. Brusquely brushing aside anxious queries from family members and friends of the sick is certainly not what is expected from doctors and it would do good for everyone, particularly the professionals who are there to care for the sick and dying, to question themselves why this observation has been made in this column. Chief Minister N Biren has delivered a meaningful statement and it is only right that everyone acknowledge the point that for any relationship to work, it needs the cooperation of either side. The patient-doctor relationship is not an exception and it would do good for all to remember that patients confide their most intimate details to the doctor treating him or her and this should underline the level of trust between the two sides. It is only right that all respect this trust and once this is realised fully then all can be well between the doctor and his or her patient.
Source: The Sangai Express
