Conflict of Interest

One of the things that has been most challenging this year is balancing the excitement that I feel when diagnosing a new illness or learning about it and the compassion that I need to feel for my patients, who are real people who are suffering. My team diagnosed one of my patients with an uncommon autoimmune disease, and I have to admit, it was kind of thrilling to try to figure out what was going on. I felt more than a little bit victorious when we found the correct diagnosis. Then I had to stop and think...this disease carries a poor prognosis for my patient, who is young and about to get married. He is going to have such a difficult life now...better now that we know how to treat the illness...but really hard all the same.

I wonder how doctors in the "real world" handle this. Obviously, I wouldn't have gotten into this field if i didn't find the prospect of diagnosing and treating illness exciting. I just don't want to ever treat my patients like "cases" and not like people.