Doctors without protection

There is a proverb back home in Iraq that states: “When a camel falls, knives abound around it.” It means something like this: when an individual who many secretly would like a piece of encounters a difficult situation, the onslaught of criticism is merciless, like a pack of ravenous wild dogs. My memory of this proverb was triggered when I found out that one of my colleagues has been going through difficult times, and I saw people’s knives—particularly on social media—abound around him. As a mid-age doctor, my colleague strives to care for his patients, but anxiety-inducing patients and troublemakers surround him. Read: Dr. Jabir Jassam: Family medicine collapse is at the root of the health system collapse One day he opened his eyes to discover that he was in a battle with someone who seemed to enjoy disturbing doctors. He found himself being questioned and fighting for his innocence. It was as if he was in a barren desert devoid of everything—except for stray arrows fired at him by strangers that he could not truly see (ah, modern social media). As I told my colleague, I am confident that our college investigators will uncover the truth, but I wondered how much pain he will go through until that happens. Can there be any compensation for my colleague’s stress, time, legitimate anxiety and lack of sleep? In such a situation, how else could he have responded to someone who seemed to want to ruin his reputation for no other reason than he had said “no” to their request? Was licking his wounds the only thing he could do? If he quits medicine altogether, who can blame him? Doctors, is this the life we dreamt of? Most of our patients are lovely but it seems that some people we dedicate our time to helping are not afraid to stab us without a reason. I emailed him and said: “Don’t worry and do not be afraid, my friend. This is all ‘fishing in murky waters’ as we say back home. In this polluted era, beauty has been mixed with ugliness until ugliness dominates.” It shocked me to read the harsh language and profanity written against our colleague on some websites, along with the “likes” clicked by some readers—although I am sure they don’t understand anything about the problem. In my view, the Canadian Medical Protective Association has a limited role and it is probably beyond their scope to actively defend doctors against social media attacks. Nor do the Canadian Medical Association nor the Ontario Medical Association play that role. Therefore, I would do the same as I have done in the past and call for a Physicians' Defence Association but I know unfortunately this will not happen and we will continue swimming in an ocean of problems without a lifeboat. To my dear colleague: Yes my friend, unfortunately, when physicians stumble, arrows will abound around them because they are doctors. Dr. Jabir Jassam is a family physician in Ottawa.

Doctors without protection

Register for free access or login.

Related Topics