Re: Why- why-why this hypocrisy?

[Guest guest]

Ref: Tarit Chakraborty's message on " why- why-why this hypocrisy " ?

Hello! This is in reference to your mail depicting the hippocracy of a medical

doctor involved in the care of HIV patients. I am as shocked and disappointed

as you, with the attitude of the so called doctor, social worker in " helping "

her sister and the society in fighting the stigma against HIV-AIDS.

In the first place, every person has a right to know as to what illness he/she

suffering from, whether it is malaria, typhoid,Diabetes or HIV infection. The

person has a right to know the various lines of treatments available,the course

of the disease, the

prognosis,the effects and the side effects of the medicines he is going to be

prescribed.

It is the duty of the treating physician to encourage the patient to ask all

these queries if he/sh is not opening up on his/ her own.It is more important to

explain all these aspects to the poor and the

illiterate class of our people. Unless this approach is followed by all the

doctors, they fail to 'reach out' to their patients in the true sense and just

treat the patients mechanically.Hence when the patient is being treated for

bleeding piles, the surgeon must look beyond the rectum of the patient, and when

a lady has pain in lower abdomen, the doctor has not only treat the pelvic

inflammatory disease (the probable cause of pain) but also look for other

botheation the patient is having.

I have got enormous positive response of my this attitude towords my patients.We

reach out to each other very well. They never feel betrayed because i look at

them as a human being and not as

'an organ or sysem' suffering.

Because some doctors don't have this empethetic attitude towards the patients,

they land up doing what this dr.Debpriya Banerjee is doing.

I will suggest you to take this up as an important issue in your meetings and

help this PLHA get justice.Also you help the Dr. Debpriya rectify herself,

considering the fact 'to err is human!'

Best wishes,

Dr.Divya Mithel

E-mail: <d_mithel@...>