Praise be to Allah, Who has enabled us to face the challenges of our first few days of internship, Who has, by His Own Hands, gotten rid of the troubles of being a doctor that we ourselves could not have.
Peace and blessings be upon Muhammad the Messenger of Allah, who has set the most perfect example of being humane.
As I returned home at the end of my first week as a doctor (31 December 2009), I felt I could ward off all medical thoughts from my mind till the next week, but “does man have what he desires?” “Indeed Allah will test him with some fear . . .”
So it came to happen. I reached home just before Asr, showered rapidly and hurried to the mosque. As I entered, I saw what I have never seen before, I mean not in a mosque — a crowd standing in a circle. We have seen many such crowds on the streets, and the very formation of the crowd tells us that there is a distressed person at the centre of the circle. But in the mosque? I thought someone has died and has been brought to the mosque for janazah. But never have I seen people standing around the dead person like this — this part of expression of sorrow is usually done at home, before coming to the mosque. So what could it be?
Before I understood anything, someone called out, “Here comes the doctor. Please, you’ll have to see this.” By then I was well aware that this could turn into my worst nightmare — an unconscious person out in the street (or in the mosque) is not the best patient to handle. All through medical school, I had wondered how I’d deal with such situations when I had almost nothing in my favour. Here I was, in the middle of a crowd, with a man lying unconscious, and the whole responsibility of bringing him back to life was solely on my shoulders. I had always felt that I myself would lose my senses in such a situation, but “it is He Who showers tranquility upon the hearts of believers, so that He may reinforce their Faith with greater Faith” (48:4). I don’t know any other explanation of how I handled the entire case with complete calmness, not losing my temper or raising my voice a single time.
As the crowd made way for me, I saw a strongly built, middle aged man lying peacefully on his back. “Perhaps he’s just sleeping after all,” I thought, but the crowd informed me that he was not responding to their calls to wake up. Instinctively, my thumb was already on his carotid, and its pulsation was absolutely normal in rate and rhythm. I also noticed the warmth of his body, and the very regular respiratory movements of his abdomen. Someone told me that his teeth were clenched and his eyes were rolled when they found him.
“It seems he’d had an epileptic fit, and has fallen asleep out of exhaustion,” I said.
“But his pockets are empty — no money, no phone, no papers. It looks like he’s been poisoned and robbed,” came the reply from an onlooker.
Now I had to recalculate. There was absolutely no abnormality in the person in terms of the vital signs of life : heart rate, body temperature, respiratory rate and presumably also blood pressure. Thinking in this way, I could say “no problem”. But thinking in another way, his coma score was 3 — eyes closed, no verbal response, no movement even after the most painful stimulus (rolling knuckles over the sternum) — that’s a red alert.
At this point, I thought I’ll go with the teaching of Sir Robert Hutchison, “ . . . from placing science before art and knowledge before wisdom and cleverness before common sense . . . Good Lord, deliver us.” My instincts told me that what I was seeing was medically no more than an overdose of sleep-inducing drugs (albeit given by “oggyan party”), and the treatment was to let the person sleep it off.
Here I was faced with what is perhaps the greatest challenge of the medical profession — convincing the crowd. It’s easy to read the chapter on “poisoning” in the book, but it’s a different thing to actually understand what poison has been applied to the person and how to treat it, and a yet different thing to assure the crowd that all the other worries that they’re having are not applicable here.
Standing at the centre of attention, I tried to count the points in my favour — this is “my” mosque, “my” neighbourhood, the crowd is largely “my” crowd, and in a crowd as this, everyone is too eager to put forward a suggestion or advice, but no one wants the responsibility to be put on their shoulders.
Maintaining my calm, I said to the person standing next to me, “It looks like he’s been poisoned with an overdose of sleep-inducing drugs. Let’s allow him to sleep it off — that’s the most feasible treatment.”
“Won’t he need any counter-medication?” someone said.
“No, you can’t leave him here like this. He’d have to be given a stomach wash, otherwise he’ll die,” someone else said, sounding full of wisdom and confidence.
This made me want to look this person in the face and say, “If you’re such a big-shot doctor, why don’t you step over here and handle the case?” but Allah loves patience.
Still holding my composure, I said, “If he could be taken to a hospital or clinic, they could test his blood and find out the exact cause of this deep sleep, and perhaps could give an antidote if needed. But I don’t think there’s any dangerous poison that would require a stomach wash — there’s no vomit, foaming from mouth, vomiting out blood, spontaneous defecation or urination to suggest such a poison. So if you feel you can handle it, let some of you volunteer to take him to a health facility.”
It seemed that my calculations were paying off. As the doctor, I have told them there is nothing to worry, and that is all they wanted to know — to be honest to their own conscience. The crowd was well convinced, by the Mercy of Allah, and they went their ways and I went mine.
I was confident that I had made the right choices, fully aware that these were choices that could make the difference between life and death. Still, a doctor can never be fully at ease until the patient smiles broadly and says, “I’m fine now.”
Just about an hour later, I entered the mosque for Maghrib looking at the place where he had been lying, and he was not there! This could either mean that he had recovered and gone away, or things had become worse and he had to be ‘taken’ away. It is quite amazing that even this did not puzzle or confuse me, rather I looked around for him, looking with certainty for the signs among people that would say the man had recovered and gone away. Everyone at the mosque seemed to be at ease, reinforcing my expectation that nothing had gone wrong.
Then I spotted the very man, sitting in a corner, looking devastated, for although his health had been preserved, his wealth was lost. Our Imam made an official request and our neighbours instantly contributed to pay for the man’s travel back to his hometown in Satkhira. But we all knew that there was not a way we could give back to the man what he had lost — his capital. All we could do for him was to pray, for it is Allah Who provides our provisions.
To Him belongs the Dominions of the heavens and the earth, and to Him is our Return.
Peace and blessings be upon Muhammad the Messenger of Allah, who has set the most perfect example of being humane.
As I returned home at the end of my first week as a doctor (31 December 2009), I felt I could ward off all medical thoughts from my mind till the next week, but “does man have what he desires?” “Indeed Allah will test him with some fear . . .”
So it came to happen. I reached home just before Asr, showered rapidly and hurried to the mosque. As I entered, I saw what I have never seen before, I mean not in a mosque — a crowd standing in a circle. We have seen many such crowds on the streets, and the very formation of the crowd tells us that there is a distressed person at the centre of the circle. But in the mosque? I thought someone has died and has been brought to the mosque for janazah. But never have I seen people standing around the dead person like this — this part of expression of sorrow is usually done at home, before coming to the mosque. So what could it be?
Before I understood anything, someone called out, “Here comes the doctor. Please, you’ll have to see this.” By then I was well aware that this could turn into my worst nightmare — an unconscious person out in the street (or in the mosque) is not the best patient to handle. All through medical school, I had wondered how I’d deal with such situations when I had almost nothing in my favour. Here I was, in the middle of a crowd, with a man lying unconscious, and the whole responsibility of bringing him back to life was solely on my shoulders. I had always felt that I myself would lose my senses in such a situation, but “it is He Who showers tranquility upon the hearts of believers, so that He may reinforce their Faith with greater Faith” (48:4). I don’t know any other explanation of how I handled the entire case with complete calmness, not losing my temper or raising my voice a single time.
As the crowd made way for me, I saw a strongly built, middle aged man lying peacefully on his back. “Perhaps he’s just sleeping after all,” I thought, but the crowd informed me that he was not responding to their calls to wake up. Instinctively, my thumb was already on his carotid, and its pulsation was absolutely normal in rate and rhythm. I also noticed the warmth of his body, and the very regular respiratory movements of his abdomen. Someone told me that his teeth were clenched and his eyes were rolled when they found him.
“It seems he’d had an epileptic fit, and has fallen asleep out of exhaustion,” I said.
“But his pockets are empty — no money, no phone, no papers. It looks like he’s been poisoned and robbed,” came the reply from an onlooker.
Now I had to recalculate. There was absolutely no abnormality in the person in terms of the vital signs of life : heart rate, body temperature, respiratory rate and presumably also blood pressure. Thinking in this way, I could say “no problem”. But thinking in another way, his coma score was 3 — eyes closed, no verbal response, no movement even after the most painful stimulus (rolling knuckles over the sternum) — that’s a red alert.
At this point, I thought I’ll go with the teaching of Sir Robert Hutchison, “ . . . from placing science before art and knowledge before wisdom and cleverness before common sense . . . Good Lord, deliver us.” My instincts told me that what I was seeing was medically no more than an overdose of sleep-inducing drugs (albeit given by “oggyan party”), and the treatment was to let the person sleep it off.
Here I was faced with what is perhaps the greatest challenge of the medical profession — convincing the crowd. It’s easy to read the chapter on “poisoning” in the book, but it’s a different thing to actually understand what poison has been applied to the person and how to treat it, and a yet different thing to assure the crowd that all the other worries that they’re having are not applicable here.
Standing at the centre of attention, I tried to count the points in my favour — this is “my” mosque, “my” neighbourhood, the crowd is largely “my” crowd, and in a crowd as this, everyone is too eager to put forward a suggestion or advice, but no one wants the responsibility to be put on their shoulders.
Maintaining my calm, I said to the person standing next to me, “It looks like he’s been poisoned with an overdose of sleep-inducing drugs. Let’s allow him to sleep it off — that’s the most feasible treatment.”
“Won’t he need any counter-medication?” someone said.
“No, you can’t leave him here like this. He’d have to be given a stomach wash, otherwise he’ll die,” someone else said, sounding full of wisdom and confidence.
This made me want to look this person in the face and say, “If you’re such a big-shot doctor, why don’t you step over here and handle the case?” but Allah loves patience.
Still holding my composure, I said, “If he could be taken to a hospital or clinic, they could test his blood and find out the exact cause of this deep sleep, and perhaps could give an antidote if needed. But I don’t think there’s any dangerous poison that would require a stomach wash — there’s no vomit, foaming from mouth, vomiting out blood, spontaneous defecation or urination to suggest such a poison. So if you feel you can handle it, let some of you volunteer to take him to a health facility.”
It seemed that my calculations were paying off. As the doctor, I have told them there is nothing to worry, and that is all they wanted to know — to be honest to their own conscience. The crowd was well convinced, by the Mercy of Allah, and they went their ways and I went mine.
I was confident that I had made the right choices, fully aware that these were choices that could make the difference between life and death. Still, a doctor can never be fully at ease until the patient smiles broadly and says, “I’m fine now.”
Just about an hour later, I entered the mosque for Maghrib looking at the place where he had been lying, and he was not there! This could either mean that he had recovered and gone away, or things had become worse and he had to be ‘taken’ away. It is quite amazing that even this did not puzzle or confuse me, rather I looked around for him, looking with certainty for the signs among people that would say the man had recovered and gone away. Everyone at the mosque seemed to be at ease, reinforcing my expectation that nothing had gone wrong.
Then I spotted the very man, sitting in a corner, looking devastated, for although his health had been preserved, his wealth was lost. Our Imam made an official request and our neighbours instantly contributed to pay for the man’s travel back to his hometown in Satkhira. But we all knew that there was not a way we could give back to the man what he had lost — his capital. All we could do for him was to pray, for it is Allah Who provides our provisions.
To Him belongs the Dominions of the heavens and the earth, and to Him is our Return.
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