‘It’s not about me anymore’
Lori Burke, now a third-year medical student, worked with an older woman who has struggled for years with fibromyalgia, an arthritis-related condition that causes chronic pain in the muscles, tendons and joints. They talked at length about how the disease had robbed the woman of a normal life, confining her to bed for long periods and isolating her in her house. They talked, too, of the difficulty of dealing with physicians who persist in believing that fibromyalgia — notoriously difficult to diagnose and treat — is “all in the patient’s head.”
“When you or I get sick, we go through it and it lasts maybe five to seven days; the virus runs its course. When she gets sick, she can’t move. She can’t get out of bed. All the medications you want to give her, she’s allergic to. She’s in pain everywhere.
“She’d go to one doctor and because of insurance changes she’d have to go to another doctor and then another, and try to convey to them all these years of medical history and the extensive work-ups she’s had and the different tests she’s had — it was just terrible for her. She’d be waiting in a clinic that’s running two hours behind and then she’d meet this doctor who didn’t believe her.
“Now, as a third-year student, I know that clinics do run behind, and I’m amazed that patients wait so long. They just want to hear our thoughts on things, and we owe it to them to listen to their story, at least, and not to write them off as if they don’t exist. That’s something I try to take with me.
“My mom always told me, ‘If you do want to be a doctor, give them five minutes to talk and really listen to them. Validate what they’re saying.’
“I know, now, just from being on the floor in the hospital for eight months, that some things really trouble patients and are big concerns — as doctors-in-training, we know these concerns may not be serious, but they can really weigh on people’s minds. If we can just let them talk about it and say, ‘I understand why that can be a big problem for you,’ it helps a lot. It helps you connect to them.
“At the end of my second year, I thanked her for letting me experience everything she’s gone through and for being so open with me, but really for helping me realize that it’s not about me anymore.”
—James Tobin
Also:
Physician-Patient Alliance: The Importance of Support
Remembering the Person within the Patient
