Who is the patient?

In the readings from The Spirit Catches You, the most peculiar observation I made was the interconnected and sometimes juxtaposed roles of the doctor and the patient. We all know very well the societal definitions of who is the doctor and who is the patient, but in the doctors' interactions with Hmong patients, I often felt it were the physicians who were being treated. Some of the doctors needed more severe treatment for their disease that was ignorance. The Hmong patients indirectly or sometimes directly taught the doctors how to feel for others, how to bridge cultural barriers, and thus how to most effectively provide care, and eventually bring peace and wellness into the doctor's mind and aptitude.

This inter-relationship between the doctor and the patient is one that must be embraced if we are to learn the people we are trying to help. Ignorant treatment may very well result in the opposite outcomes, and one of the tenets of the Hippocratic Oath is to know the patient.

Galym