You are going to share in the most intimate parts of your patients' lives. You will share in their moments of tragedy. But you will also share in their moments of greatest joy.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the deep emotional connection healthcare professionals have with their patients, experiencing both their pain and joy.
Kent Brantly's quote highlights the profound role that healthcare providers play in the lives of their patients. They are not merely healers of physical ailments, but also companions who share in the intimate experiences of their patients, from moments of deep tragedy to episodes of immense joy. This bond underscores the importance of empathy, compassion, and human connection in medicine, illustrating that the practice of healthcare is as much about emotional support as it is about clinical knowledge.
In practice
In a speech to new medical interns about the importance of patient relationships.
How many of us have conflicts with someone else- and how many of us pray for that person? We have individuals with whom we are competitive, or whom we dislike or have a quarrel with; but very few of us have true enemies in the martial sense. And yet if Lincoln could pray fervently- and contemporary reports indicate he did- for the people who were opposing him, how much more can we do for someone we just find a little irritating?
Promises are worse than lies. You don't just make them believe, you also make them hope.
He’s gone, Harry told himself. He’s gone. He had to keep thinking it as he washed and dressed, as though repetition would dull the shock of it. He’s gone and he’s not coming back. And that was the simple truth of it, Harry knew, because their protective enchantments meant that it would be impossible, once they vacated this spot, for Ron to find them again.
I loved you because there was no other place for me to go. We were married because we did not know what else to do with each other. You never knew me, nothing about me, what died inside me, what lived invisibly.
As disabled people, we are taught from a young age that those who are attracted to us are to be regarded with suspicion.
My theory is that everyone at one time or another has been at the fringe of society in some way: an outcast in high school, a stranger in a foreign country, the best at something, the worst at something, the one who's different. Being an outsider is the one thing we all have in common.
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