Wishes

I had a flashback on a very occasion in my junior surgical clerkship. I was in UCH attaching to their surgical department. Lacking of any knowledge about surgery, I did not know what to do exactly in the wards, I could just find some patients who were lying comfortably on the beds to talk.

The professors says, the patients are the best teachers for us. But for convenience, I preferred to find some young patients who were supposed to be communicable, in order to commence my learning activities. I was in the 8B ward with patients having urological problems, following the evening round. The doctors took a lengthy time discussing the treatment plans for the patients, most of their conversations I did not understand.

Afterwards, I talked to the patient who was reading a Bible, at the bedside there was a wood cross. Chief complaint, history of present illness, past medical history......I wrote them up but did not know what was really going on with him. How stupid I was, I thought to myself, to spend precious time with a young patient with some incomprehensible history. Finishing my history taking, I was puzzled by him, and the words from the professors.

"I 've got a growth in the pelvis that the doctors did not know how to treat, so I don't think you can know it clearly!" He told me, smiling. The discussion finally came to nothing since I could not make any reasonable guess. I checked his medical record and really saw a weird diagnosis, presumably a rare malignant disease.

So coming back to this time, when my senior surgical clerkship has ended and the year of Snake has come, I recalled that situation. Rare diseases seldom are seldom curable, not to mention a malignant one. The statisticians who thought they know the truth (within the confidence interval) will probably conclude that the gentlemen should have gone already.

But I know he still stay in this world, or at least in my mind. I wish him happy new year, and stay healthy, my teacher.