What do you say when a man that is broken physically, mentally and emotionally, asks you, “why me?”. In both sessions I was signed up for during this quarter in Words on the Wards, I was asked this question by the first patient I saw at ZSFGH. As student pharmacists and practicing pharmacists, we love sharing resources, our knowledge, our information. But even as an early learner, I have already been stumped and been faced with uncertainty when a patient asked me this simplistic, yet profoundly heartbreaking question of why. I didn’t know what to say. I’m not sure I ever will know what to say.
The first patient I ever saw in WoW was homeless, estranged from his children, wife and family, a former Vietnam veteran, had ongoing substance abuse issues and had been a diabetic for 12 years but never gave himself insulin because he was never taught. In the most professional and compassionate way, I wanted to ask, “who failed you?”, “who hurt you?”, “what/who broke you?”. This man had a story - I wanted to know more. I learned in this session that people that have stories and unmet needs, need to have their will, in the road to healing. While I went on to discuss diet, lifestyle and food for managing diabetes with him, I could never forget the look of apathy in his eyes for himself when he described that he no longer cared for his own health.
This experience made me realize that all patient stories are important and that perhaps it may have been a long time since someone had asked him about it, but maybe if someone throughout his life had simply slowed down and asked him truly how he is doing, his story would have been different. While I realized that I’m never going to have all the answers even after a PharmD in hand, it’s part of my duty as a healthcare professional to always check in with those I come in contact with, where providing a bit of my time may spark a new dialogue of compassion that could redirect someone’s story.