“The doctors, it seemed, never really had enough time for all the patients, try as they might. And over the course of six months, I would corner them in the hallway and ask them a sort of naive, but fundamental question. If you had unlimited resources, what’s the one thing you would give your patients? And I heard the same story again and again, a story we’ve heard hundreds of times since then… ‘Child has an ear infection. I prescribe antibiotics, but the real issue is there’s no food at home. The real issue is that child is living with 12 other people in a two-bedroom apartment, and I don’t even ask about those issues because there’s nothing I can do. I have 13 minutes with each patient. Patients are piling up in the clinic waiting room. I have no idea where the nearest food pantry is, and I don’t even have any help.’”

 — Rebecca Onie talking about a program she started, Health Leads, that trains college students to help patients find ways to get food, heating, water - basic living requirements allowing doctors at partner institutions (my hospital is one of them!) to give such “prescriptions.”

This is a real problem - as I have seen personally rotating in Baltimore hospitals and clinics. I’m so glad there are programs like these out there. I hope it expands to include many other institutions and/or other people are inspired to do something similar for their hospitals/clinics.

But I would also argue that something else a doctor always wishes he/she could give more of to their patients is time. I’m sure Rebecca Onie also got that answer when she asked her naive, fundamental question to those doctors.

“One of the things that I keep going back to over and over again is how do we sensitize clinicians to the patient’s cultural worlds so that we can better understand what’s normal for them and what’s abnormal for them, because only once we’ve done that can we then start to tailor our treatments plans to help our patients in the ways they need in order to lead the lives they want.”

 — Asian American Mental Health - YouTube project from 4th year psychiatry resident at Columbia

“You don’t train someone for all of those years of medical school and residency, particularly people who want to help others optimize their physical and psychological health, and then have them run a claims-processing operation for insurance companies.”

 — Malcolm Gladwell, from Forbes’ "Tell People What it’s Really Like to be a Physician"

It was really hard picking one section to quote because I loved almost every line of this article. <3 Malcolm Gladwell. Is he married?? Lol, joking.