Siddharth Shah

9/13/2021

What reflections do you have on what you learned or what you now think about the experience of being a patient after watching the movie?

Being a patient can be very tough, in my personal experience after being diagnosed with Crohn’s disease I could tell how Dr. McKee felt when he was told he has cancer. So many questions are going through your mind, why me, what does this mean, and how will this be managed, and affect my life going forward. There is anxiety after being diagnosed with something you never thought would happen to you. You see this when Dr. McKee is worried about losing his voice. He is anxious to know his MRI results to see if the cancer has spread. As with everyone, there are other worries outside of our health, such as school, family, and work, but once you add in health issues it just compounds on you and can make things difficult especially with relationships. We see this when Dr. McKee can connect with June better than his wife. Personally, the biggest take away was the frustration Dr. McKee had with Dr. Abbott, with her inability to connect with Dr. McKee, and understand his frustration, and worries something that resonated with me very well, and led me to switch providers, just like Dr. McKee did with his surgery.

 

Please note specific examples of how physicians treated patients in the movie (how the main character, Dr. Jack McKee was treated and how he treated other patients) – in light of what you now know about patient communication

In an earlier scene we see Dr. McKee joke around with his female patient about her scars, and how she worries they won’t heal properly, will no longer be attractive to her husband, instead of sympathizing, and easing her fears he jokes around and says she now looks like “playboy centerfold, and has the staple marks to prove it”, and then laughs. You can see the patient isn’t amused, and nor does she feel any better about her concerns. This is not consistent with patient-centered communication at all. Even though the patient has been healed from her underlying disease, she is facing an emotional issue regarding her scars, and isn’t feeling any compassion from Dr. McKee. The patient is having a body image issue, that Dr. McKee might not be trained to handle, but if he listened to her and took a patient centered approach, he could’ve directed her to therapist who specializes in body image issues, and would’ve treated the patient, and not just the disease.

 

Dr. Mckee was treated better than he treated his patients, even though Dr. Abbot wasn’t the most sympathizing with his concerns. Once the tumor grew and the only option left was surgery Dr. Abbot was available in the afternoon for the surgery, however Dr. McKee objects to the time, and would prefer to be seen first, instead Dr. Abbot tells him “You are my patient, and I’ll see you when I’m available”. Dr. Abbot isn’t paying attention to Dr. McKee issue about losing his voice which he has mentioned since he was diagnosed, this is a concern outside of his disease, and Dr. Abbot is only concerned with treating his cancer.  In a patient-centered approach Dr. Abbot could’ve worked to reschedule a time that works best for them both. Instead, Dr. McKee fires Dr. Abbot as his provider, and finds a different surgeon for his surgery, one he trusts, and is listens to the patients.

In the last scene where Dr. McKee has an exercise for his interns where they have to be in the role of patients:

What do you think they would learn from the exercise?

From this exercise the interns will know what it’s like to be a patient, and how getting all these testes ordered can be at times be scary as the anxiousness sits in while waiting for results. We see this with Dr. McKee when he got his MRI and wanted to know if the cancer has spread. The exercise also lets the interns feel embarrassed as well when they are told to wear gowns, and how uncomfortable it can be wearing one and walking around the hospital with one. Something Dr. McKee went through during his biopsy. From this exercise I believe the interns will know what it is like be a patient, and how they would like their providers to communicate with them. This in-turn will enable the interns to be able to sympathize, and empathize with the patients, and see them as “humans”, instead of another person they will cut open one day. Going through this exercise they will have a more patient-centered approach instead of a clinician-centered one Dr. McKee has been teaching them for so long.

 

How do you think it might make them talk to patients or treat patients differently?

We see Dr. McKee tone change with his patients after he became one. This practice will allow the interns to role-play what is like being a patient. In one of the scenes Dr. McKee tells Dr. Kaplan he won’t testify in his court case, because Dr. Kaplan treated a patient with thrombophlebitis as an irrelevant issue, leading the patient to have a negative outcome. During these roleplays the interns will be able to understand issues patients have and deep dive into the patient’s medical history, allowing the interns to become more cognizant of other underlying issues patient has, not ignore them like Dr. Kaplan. In one of the scenes when walking with his interns Dr. McKee asks who we are seeing next and one of the interns responds, “The terminal in room 1217”, Dr. McKee responds in anguish, and asks for the patient’s names and tells the intern to never call a patient terminal. Going through these role-plays interns will be able to develop a patient centered approach, and be able to emphasize, and sympathize with the patient they are treating, after having become a patient themselves. The role playing will change how interns view patients, leading to more meaningful interactions.