"What do you need Pratheek?" As a 3 year old who had just arrived in America from India, it was impossible for me tell my preschool teacher that I needed to use the restroom. All of my frantic gesturing and squirming was to no avail. In the first month after my family immigrated, I dreaded going to school. My inability to speak English prevented me from communicating my basic needs. My mother, recognizing my distress, challenged herself to teach me English. She did this by exclusively speaking to me in Telugu and expecting to respond in English. Within a month, I began communicating with my peers and teachers in school. Even as a child, I could appreciate the social changes that accompanied the knowledge my mother passed on to me. It was then I learned the value of a good teacher. Although I had always wanted to become a physician, it was my early connection to teaching that eventually helped me discover my true passion for medicine.
This experience from my childhood eventually led me to explore teaching by becoming a tutor in college. I initially struggled to help students who asked me to explain broader topics rather than ask straightforward questions. I quickly realized that the way I learned complex topics would not work for others. I learned the Krebs cycle by memorizing the names of the enzymes and connecting them to the movement of carbons throughout the cycle. However, other students I tutored could benefit from visualizing the cycle as a car line in which passengers are dropped off and picked up. After realizing that teaching methods are highly student based, my time as a tutor became more challenging, but also more rewarding.
In addition to tutoring, I continued to pursue my interests in medicine by shadowing physicians in college. However, shadowing Dr. Brian Sims, a neonatologist, allowed me to connect my interests in teaching and medicine. Dr. Sims was also a teaching physician and had the responsibility of training the next generation of doctors in addition to taking care of his patients. Observing the duality of his role was interesting, but I noticed that Dr. Sims never seemed to struggle in training his residents as I did as a tutor. Already an expert in his field, he was able to easily pass his knowledge onto his students. My initial impression was that any well trained neonatologist could fill Dr. Sims's shoes.
It wasn't until I witnessed my first death while shadowing Dr. Sims that I found another essential avenue for teaching in medicine. After trying to resuscitate a baby boy for hours while waiting for his parents to arrive, Dr. Sims finally had to let him go. The child's family began to frantically throw questions at Dr. Sims. "Why did this happen?" "Why didn't you do more?" "Why weren't we aware of this earlier?" I wondered how Dr. Sims, a brilliant physician who spent his days treating babies and teaching residents, could possibly explain the situation to a family that was clueless about the situation. However, as he spent the next hour educating the family about the boy's illness and the complication that lead to his death, I recognized why Dr. Sims was such a great physician. It was not the vast amount of knowledge that he had, but the empathy and patience he had to impart it to his patients and their families. Dr. Sims's actions taught me that all good doctors are providers of care, but great doctors are also teachers to their patients. This realization gave me a new appreciation for the role of a physician and solidified my passion for medicine.
With this in mind, I sought to implement what I had learned about teaching in my role as an ER technician. I found myself taking the time to explain what I was doing as I ran tests on patients, or why a patient was not allowed to have any food or water, or why they needed to have blood drawn. I also aimed to understand each patient and present such information in a way that best suited them. Doing this made the patients I encountered more comfortable to ask me for help and made me more confident as a provider. Also, the attitudes of patients I interacted with gradually improved. While before, patients became very irritated at having to wait for long hours in the ER, they were now more at ease as I was able to help them understand the steps we were taking to improve their health. The gratification in their eyes reminded me of all the times I looked up at my mother in appreciation of our early English lessons.
The training a physician receives provides a wealth of knowledge and skill, but the ability to craft information and present it to each patient in an understandable way is the cornerstone of being a great physician. In a world where so many inefficiencies in medicine limit the quality of care that patients receive, doctors have the unique opportunity to help them to understand the details of their ailments. This not only improves their care in the present but ultimately provides them with the tools to sustain their health in the future. The outlook I have developed on healthcare through my life experiences has confirmed my desire to pursue a career in medicine. It will undoubtedly allow me to continue developing on my journey to become a physician that can both teach his patients and treat them effectively.