Problem

You may consider I think too much on those absent students and the response to VW. Well, I agree I had a surge of neuronal activity - an inevitable habit of a physician.

In fact, just now my friend KM quote in his Facebook a recent Lancet article by Danielle Ofri (Neuron overload and the juggling physician, on 27 November 2010, p 1820-1821), which express the difficulty of being a doctor - one has to consider too many (inter-related) problems that no time could be spared to listen to the patient.

This little essay actually brings my memory back to a conversion I had many years ago with the man who used to have a moustache - at the time when I just joined the nephrologist training.

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"Many of the patients are very complicated," I sighed after the round.

"You think so?" My mentor said.

"Of course. I am coming to the conclusion that anyone who could speak out - without taking a second breathe - the list of medical problems that this patient has, or the list of medications that he is taking, has a lung function good enough for general anesthesia!" I smiled, pointing at one particularly complicated patient.

"Yes, his problem is complicated," the professor smiled back, "But that's where the challenge comes along: you've got to make it simple."

"Well, yes ... but how?" For a moment I though the man who still had a moustache was saying nothing but a Sunday school truth.

"A good start is, each time when you see a patient, you identify the single most important problem - maybe out of a thousand of them - and focus your effort to tackle that one." He said calmly.

I nodded, reflecting this insightful advise for the rest of the day - or the rest of my career.