Patient-First Language

October 20 is Pharmacy Technician Day around the world—a day to celebrate and thank the folks who do so much to keep the pharmacy operating and the dispensary flowing.

Last week, Quebec's government ordered an inquiry into the death of Joyce Echaquan, an Indigenous woman from Manawan who recorded workers at the Centre hospitalier de Lanaudière in Joliette mocking her with sexist and racist abuse soon before she died.

Quebec's health ministry recently stated it intends to issue 98 family doctor permits for 2021, comparable to this year.

After all these many years as a loyal member, I have to admit to a certain level of disappointment with my family. It’s not that they haven’t been supportive of me in my several failed attempts at marital coherence -they have always been patient with my stumbles. Nor did they denounce me each time I deserted them for greener pastures, or question my procreative abilities when I limited myself to two offspring. No, my family has always been there for me, and flexible in its expectations.

She was being followed yearly by some of the more famous specialists in the city and was on a first name basis with them. I asked what she did and she humbly told me some very general descriptions.

For a short period of time, COVID-19 has taken handshakes, hugs, cheek kisses and words of greeting away from us. But, do you know what is really sad? We were already losing these very important culturally appropriate greetings, well before COVID-19. Their loss adds to our sense of loneliness and isolation and our feelings of being disconnected, vulnerable and unsafe.

Every photo has a background. It holds the details hiding behind the main attraction: people walking by, engaged in their own conversations; piles of mail that have not been tidied; dishes in a sink; other people’s beach towels; storefronts and parking meters. These are the parts of a photograph you did not intend to capture, the accidental participants in your memory. This is the place where I exist.

Longevity in medicine necessitates some degree of desensitization. This is part of how we grow. It’s essential. This evolution, however, can come with a cost. With our competence comes the insidious erosion of empathy that creeps in, hand-in-hand with our competence, quietly, relentlessly, and destructively.