Tag Archives: communication

On Walking the Talk

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NaBloPoMo 2016, Letters to Patients, Day 4

To My Patients Who Wonder, “How Healthy Is Your Diet, Doc?”

I cannot tell a lie, it kinda sucks sometimes!  I’m not a foodie, really.  In fact, I have maybe the least discriminating palate of anyone I know—everything tastes good!  I particularly love sugar, starch, salt, and oil—especially in combination.

So when I talk to you about the picnic plate method of eating—half stems/stalks/leaves/fruit, a quarter high quality lean protein, and a quarter whole grain—believe me, I understand the challenge!  In fact, every time I counsel you, I review my own food log in my head, and I resolve to visit the raw salad bar more often.  When I give advice or make suggestions, it’s not that I necessarily know better than you, or that I think I’m better than you.  We’re all here doing our best every day.  It’s my job to look out for your health, which research tells us is only 20% related to what I do in the clinic or hospital, and 30% related to your own habits (incidentally, it’s 40% related to your environment).  So if I can help you make even the smallest change for the better, then I feel useful.

When I ask you about exercise, sleep, stress management, and relationships, I am also taking stock of my own habits in those realms.  To me, these are the central domains of health.  And nobody has a perfect balance all the time.  Maybe you’re great at exercise, but your diet is the pits.  Maybe you eat really well, but you stay up too late at night.  Everybody’s patterns are different, and they shift over time.  Sometimes I might share my own fluctuating experiences with you, if it feels relevant and helpful.  But our time together is about you, not me.

I want you to feel free to ask me how I manage my own health.  It’s important to me that I Walk the Talk.  I will answer honestly, if sheepishly.  I will share my struggles with you.  I risk judgment by you when I do this, and I accept that.  One of you actually said, “Shame on you,” to me one time.  Maybe you feel judged by me, also?  I think that is inevitable.  We all judge ourselves, and then subconsciously project our judgments onto others.  I’m working on self-compassion—ask me about that, too!

It’s about strategy and execution, trial and error, and repetition.  No matter what the behavior change, the more times we try, the more likely we will finally succeed.  So the next time you come in and we talk about health habits, think of it as comparing notes, rather than reporting progress or regress.  If you found something that works, please share!  I might just steal the idea for myself.

On Plumbing and Other Disciplines

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Cartoon courtesy of Pixabay

NaBloPoMo 2016, Letters to Patients, Day 3

To My Patients With Diverse Occupations:

What a pleasure and an education to know you!

I think none of you are plumbers, though.  But I remember the first time I met a plumber—it was in college, a friend of a friend.  To this day I wonder if he thought I was a little crazy—I grilled him mercilessly about his work.  Was it like “Moonstruck,” is copper really always better?  What’s the grossest thing you’ve ever seen?  What do you need to know, is there plumbing school?  How do you know when you can’t do a job?  What equipment do you carry around?

I have only ever known medicine, you see.  I resisted at first—so typical, the Chinese kid who wants to be a doctor.  But then I volunteered to be a health aide in college—I got to move into the dorm a week early that way.  And it was inevitable, I was hooked!  So I went ‘straight through,’ as they say—biology/pre-med, no gap years, no real life working experience before medical school.

Traders, dog trainers, book editors, retail managers, accountants, nurses, call center agents, firefighters, small business owners, truck drivers, professors, musicians, actuaries—you all have such interesting lives!  One of my favorite parts of the history is when I get to hear what you do for a living, because it’s so different from my own.  So please be patient when I interrogate you about your work, I’m just so curious!  How do you spend your days?  What makes a great day for you?  What makes it hard?  What are the greatest sources of stress and meaning in your work/career/vocation?  What do you love about it?  Would you choose it again?

This curiosity stems from my deep desire to relate.  In your work, people probably present you with problems.  You apply specific expertise to diagnose the underlying condition.  You determine the most appropriate or attainable solution, and map out a path to achieve it.  You take some responsibility for the result, while recognizing that your coworkers must also participate fully for the team to succeed.  On your best days, the collaborative effort yields not only the desired outcome, but also a deepened connection between people.  It’s not so different for me.

It’s easy to perceive a distance between you and me, between patients and physicians.  Medicine can seem elitist sometimes, what with the onerous entrance exams, the stiff competition for school admission, and the prolonged and grueling training.  But in the end I bet we share more experiences than we realize.  I’m just here to use my little heap of knowledge and skills to help others, and I know that’s what you do, too.

 

NaBloPoMo, Here We Come!

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The Cubs have won game 5 of the World Series.  Halloween is tomorrow.  In two days I will commit to publishing a post a day for 30 days.  Woo hoooooooo, bring it!!  It’s been a year since I tried this the first time, and I almost made it—26, I believe, and a few may have been reblogs of others’ work…  I felt embarrassed about the ‘failure.’  But then I got through the A to Z Challenge by the skin of my teeth this past April (last post at 11:30pm on April 30th), and that was much more fun.  So I’m trying again, yaaay!

I launched this blog 18 months ago to address physician-patient relationship.  I aimed to discuss communication, self-awareness, and emotional intelligence, as tools to rekindle that trusting, continuous bond that so many of us miss in medicine today.  Since then I have come around to the original theme occasionally, but not nearly as often as I had intended.  So I take this annual blogging event as an opportunity to refocus and try something new.

For Na Bo Po Mo 2016, I intend to write 30 letters to patients.  Some will echo routine conversations; others may reflect my musings on this vocation.  I may examine observations on the state of medicine today.  Or other things, who knows?  I will at least attempt to convey my deep love for the work and the people.  Maybe I can help fellow physicians and patients connect, or perhaps lend some perspective and awareness.

There is a lightness to trial and error.  When you try something new, you make a commitment, set an endpoint, and decide how you will measure the outcome.  But you don’t have to attach yourself to a particular outcome, just the process.  I commit to try my best and have fun, and see what comes out, in fewer than 500 words per post.  I wonder where this will lead?  Maybe it will turn into a monthly newsletter for my own patients?  A book?  A column somewhere?  Anything is possible!  I’ll never know until I try, and I like the openness of the adventure.

I hope you will visit often, and leave your thoughtful comments.

Let the journey begin!