"Cutting for Stone"

[LingoLaine]

We come unbidden into this life, and if we are lucky we find a purpose beyond
starvation, misery, and early death which, lest we forget, is the common lot. I
grew up and I found my purpose and it was to become a physician. My intent
wasn't to save the world as much as to heal myself. Few doctors will admit this,
certainly not young ones, but subconsciously, in entering the profession, we
must believe that ministering to others will heal our woundedness.

-- from "Cutting for Stone" by Abraham Verghese

I'm just starting the book but the above quote really resonates with me. The intent of my crazy midlife med school endeavor is definitely linked to "healing my woundedness by ministering to others". Anyone else feel the same way?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[FrkyBgStok]

I suppose that depends on your definition of "woundedness." I wouldn't say that healing others would heal my shortcomings or somehow change me from being morally bankrupt, but I would admit that medicine is more to fulfill myself as opposed to a truly altruistic devotion to healing. So sure.

Fantastic book though. Good read through and through.

 

[Law2Doc]

I ... I would admit that medicine is more to fulfill myself as opposed to a truly altruistic devotion to healing....

this.

 

[DrMidlife]

Wait till you meet Hema and Ghosh. I loved that book. Read My Own Country next.

Healing through service is a true and lovely thing. But having to go through med school and residency prior to practice means I'll be getting more wounded, and keeping myself out of service, for years. I would have done nursing if this wasn't quite frankly about ego.

 

[startoverat40]

I wanted to ask a question about Ghosh, but didn't want to spoil the plot. Is the switch that he made from one field of medicine to another, at all realistic? Is there any training path that would include both? It's a nice fantasy to think that you could set up a one-stop-shop in some remote corner, and be the village doctor for everyone and do almost everything.

This is a great book. It was my "what book have you read recently" in one med school interview.

 

[FrkyBgStok]

I think in America, Ghosh couldn't do that, but he made the change out of necessity, not really by choice. And it is Ethiopia so I doubt many people were willing to say, "You can't do that."

 

[dsoz]

I wanted to ask a question about Ghosh, but didn't want to spoil the plot. Is the switch that he made from one field of medicine to another, at all realistic? Is there any training path that would include both? It's a nice fantasy to think that you could set up a one-stop-shop in some remote corner, and be the village doctor for everyone and do almost everything.

This is a great book. It was my "what book have you read recently" in one med school interview.

The book is fiction. Also, I don't know how medicine worked in countries like Ethiopia in the mid 1900s. I would assume that someone that had ANY medical training would have a little bit of both internal medicine and surgery in their experience. Med students get involved in all types of rotations to learn how others work and think.

Most of all "Necessity is the mother of invention" when someone needs to do something, they figure out a way to get it done. When no one else can do surgery, it is better to have someone partially trained than nobody that is fully trained.

I don't think that it can happen in the modern US where an internist becomes a surgeon without a second residency, but it seems like the rules may be a little more relaxed in a third world country.

PS I read the book twice in the past year. interesting read.

just a thought.
dsoz