A Touch of Genuine Humanity

Deb and I visited my radiation doc a week or so ago. Just a routine visit: "How are things going?" kind of stuff. And the doc gave me yet another assurance that everything in my head/neck area looked and felt perfectly fine.

I took the occasion to ask him about these vision issues that I blogged about in "Adventures in Modern Medicine." I wondered if the radiation treatments from last year might be responsible. (This seemed a bit more likely to me, since the vision issues occur most often on my left side -- the side where the cancer had been; and therefore the side that received the most intense radiation dosages.)

He assured me that the amount of radiation used in my treatments was well below the level that the optic nerves can tolerate. Also, that the pinpoint accuracy of the radiation delivery system kept that radiation well away from my eyes. All of that, as you might expect, was good to hear.

At the end of the visit, he paused a moment and then said: "I have a number of head/neck cancer patients just now. And when I work with them, I think of you."

I was stunned, then deeply moved by this. It seemed so out-of-character for the person I thought he was.

Thinking back on the episode, I suppose I could have asked him why he thinks of me when working with other patients; but at the time, I was so touched by the intimacy of his comment that it didn't occur to me to do so.

I took it as meaning that I was (and still am) a human being for him -- and not just a collection of symptoms and charts and plans for therapy. That my treatments have been a success and that he celebrates this. Like me. And Deb. And you, dear reader.

Sometimes we forget this. That the doctors in our lives might know us as real human beings -- and care about us that way.