A DOCTOR’S WORDS have stayed with me since 2012, when we held a health summit in Gurugram to mark THE WEEK’s 30th anniversary. During a town hall session at the summit, Dr Gaurav Gupta was asked why certain doctors “pushed” invasive options while others were choosy. He said the question was far too vague and that he could not in all fairness speak for others. However, he said something which I consider an expression of his faith and humanity. “You do not enter a temple because you can,” he said. “You do it when you must.” Gupta is now director of endovascular and cerebrovascular neurosurgery at Rutgers-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, New Jersey.
This issue of your favourite newsweekly is the annual special on India’s best hospitals, powered by THE WEEK-Hansa Research survey on the subject. I do hope that the issue will serve as a pointer to those in need. The theme this year is how medical technology is shaping our response to ailments and recovery.
While reading the article about interventional cardiologists in the cover story, I was reminded of Gupta’s statement and how far we have come since X-ray machines! Speaking of X-ray machines, I am reminded of a funny fact someone told me about. Writer Bill Bryson remembers a time when X-ray machines were common in shoe stores in the US. What for, you ask. Let Bryson himself answer you: “X-rays were so benign that shoe stores installed special machines that used them to measure foot sizes, sending penetrating rays up through the soles of your feet and right out the top of your head.” X-rays to measure foot sizes! Little wonder the humorous Bryson deployed a “benign” in his quip.
As we discuss the medical fraternity, I have to mention a news item that hurt me deeply. This week, emergency medical officer Dr Ashish Tyagi of Phagwara Civil Hospital in Punjab was beaten up by the relatives of a youth who died after being hit by a train. According to news reports, the young man was so badly injured that the hospital staff could do very little for him. My heart goes out to the grieving family, but that is no reason to unleash violence on hospital staff. It is high time we had legislation to protect hospital staff.
I myself have been at the receiving end of kindness from doctors and hospital staff. Bina and I value those relationships deeply and continue to be in touch with many of them. I know there are many others who share my feelings.
Recently I was deeply moved by a tweet shown to me, and I am certain you will be, too. US musician Joe Newberry tweeted this about his father, judge James S. Newberry: “In my dad’s last days, I asked the hospice nurse, an older woman from Alabama, ‘What is keeping him here? Why won’t he let go?’ She said, ‘Why honey, he’s got the dementia. He can’t find the door. When he finds the door, he’ll be gone.’
“After he died, I sang ‘Lone Pilgrim’ over him in the 2am darkness of his room. I turned around and saw that same nurse standing in the doorway. She came up to me, gave me a hug, and whispered, ‘He found the door.’”