Initially appeared on doktorko.com 1/4/2005.
Of course, crunching the numbers makes me look like a greedy SOB, but the money is not the endpoint; it is the means to an end.
Like Peter Parker, i believe that with great power comes great responsiblity. To whom much is given, much is required and all that blah. MDs have a lot: we are blessed with natural gifts such as intelligence (memorizing Harrison's), physical endurance (staying awake through 48-hour days), and mental toughness (absorbing a consultant's beration without crying or fainting). Many of us (myself included) even come from the top economic brackets of the population. Being ahead of the pack this much only means that more is required of us: we, the most fortunate, must help those who have less in life.
Truth be told, this is nigh-impossible in the Philippines, where the medical system is all screwed up. Having been sucked dry by the exorbitant medical school tuitions, we proceed to residency training where we earn just enough for daily jeepney rides and food at the cafeteria (which the hospitals charge us for even though we serve them as - essentially - slaves). Afterwards, we work in a private hospital where we pay a small fortune to "buy into" the practice (through purchase of stocks or rights to practice). That's when we buckle down to the real work: seeing a small number of patients a day who ask for discounts at every turn (implying that the "rich" doctor can afford to lose a peso here and there), sacrificing quality time with family and friends TO EARN A PITTANCE. Then some idiot politicos try to ram a malpractice bill penalizing doctors for committing any mistakes (including honest ones) through Congress so they can make big bucks through the malpractice insurance companies that they own.
Somewhere along the way, between trying to stay afloat and trying to earn a decent living for oneself and family, the desire to help one's fellow man gets lost. Survival is, after all, the primal instinct (procreation being the second primal instinct). And forced to choose between WORKING as a doctor to make money and PRACTICING as a doctor to help others, it's now wonder that the harassed MD most often chooses the former.
I COULD harp on how the government could give us more support, about how they could start investing in the intellectual capital that will someday turn our nation a profit. And well they should. But i was never one to look to somebody else to fix the problem. I came up with my own plan.
Consider: short-circuiting the whole process of trying to establish one's practice (like i detailed the last time). Consider again: earning an executive's salary on interest alone. The possibilities! You would be able to practice medicine without any regard for how much you were making. You would be able to charge indigents nothing and not feel remorse at not earning enough to pay your kid's next tuition. Any money made through the practice would be a bonus. Of course, this doesn't prevent you from charging rich people (and politicos) a premium, but that's beside the point.
THAT is the grand dream; to make a way for the medical practice to be selfless again. To not need to look at patients and see peso signs. To help the helpless and tend to those who have been otherwise abandoned. To become once again the noble healers that we were always destined to be.
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