It's Doctor’s (Healthcare Workers) Day!

Today is National Doctor’s Day, and it gives me time to reflect on the purpose of medicine and the gratitude I have for the tremendous work and care demonstrated by our team every day.

Doctor means to teach.

In teaching we learn and we affect others.

Creating impact for others and improving their lives is to me the purpose of medicine.

Not drugs, not diagnostics or therapies – but a very human commitment to helping others.

Francis Peabody delivered historical and keenly insightful words when he noted, “For the secret of the care of the patient is in caring for the patient.”

I think this is important to remind ourselves about this insight more today than every before. 

With the complexity of the business of medicine - billing, RVUs, Press Ganey surveys, public ratings, and a focus on the return on investment and bottom lines - medicine has gotten much more complicated.

It is easy to forget what an important role and impact we in the health profession make in people’s lives every day.

We give hope, new beginnings, supportive endings, new treatments, new knowledge, new innovations to help people live long and good lives.

But if we are in tune, we also give little pieces of ourselves to support, serve and care about the people we serve.

And in this way, we gain much ourselves.

I have been privileged to be a doctor and this professional choice has enriched my life in ways that I could never have predicted. I have learned much, have gained incredible faith in a greater spiritual plane for all of us and has led me back to my home.

Happy Doctor’s Day.