Posted Dec 16, 2002 by Pulitzer Fleming
The worst day for me was on my first night on call as an oncology house officer (thats basically a junior doc in the cancer unit). I admitted a young lad who had cancer, and had developed an infection. Despite all my best efforts, and some truly heroic care from the wonderful nurses, this lad died, in pain.
I have never felt so useless in my entire life, depsite knowing we'd done all we could. This chap was well known and liked on the ward, as he'd been receiving treatment with us for many months, and his death made the job seem so pointless, like we were trying to be some latter-day King Canute trying to hold back the tide. His family told us that his life had been improved and extended long enough to fulfil some of his dreams before he got too ill, and they felt that what we had done was worthwile - that while we hadn't cured him, we'd helped him.
As a doctor, you see many patients come and go, some get better, some move on to other specialists and some die. You try and avoid an emotional response to the death as you'd end up cracking up. There are a few that touch you and teach you so much about life that you never forget them. This was one such person.
A truly awful day at work for me, but one which I have learned so much from.
We can't cure everybody, and sometimes what happens along the way is more important than the end result (I hope that comes across as I mean it to).
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Posted Dec 17, 2002 by Zantic - Who is this woman??
 Tis all I can say/do.  
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