Go together well

Somehow five years have passed since I finished residency and since my dad's retirement party (though he had the party, he has yet to fully  retire). The passage of time is a funny thing...often when I'm running behind in my clinic schedule or when a patient arrives at 10:30 for their 8:15 appointment, I'll say something about time being a social construct or, "What even is time?" One of my coworkers and I often misquote Friedrich Nietzsche by saying, "Time is a square circle," which is our way of saying that time is meaningless or nonsensical. (I have just emerged from a deep dive into the Friedrich Nietzsche Wikipedia page where I learned or was reminded that the actual quote is "time is a flat circle" meaning essentially that history repeats itself.) Philosophies about the nature of time notwithstanding, for some reason I've decided to write a post. (Incidentally, I now have a 3-year-old daughter who occasionally uses the phrase "

{Dad, third from right, breaking ground at the site of his clinic, ~1987.} On June 24, I graduated from family medicine residency and became the fourth family physician/general practitioner in three generations of Dorwarts. A week later, on July 1, our family gathered in Sidney, Nebraska, to celebrate my dad's retirement after 35 years as a family physician there. I couldn't be prouder of the work my dad has done throughout his career, his dedication to our hometown, his persistence through difficult times, and his unwavering insistence on doing the right thing even when it's not the easy thing. Even though I considered forays into surgery and gynecologic oncology (among other things), I am happy to have found my way to family medicine and to my father's footsteps. Although my dad worked long hours throughout my childhood, I never felt like I was missing out because I appreciated the importance of what he was doing. My perception was that he was spending his d

On Valentine’s Day, as I was walking back toward the hospital after buying a Coke from the Red Cross canteen (a little shop adjacent to the hospital “car park” where they sell snacks, soft drinks, and sadza ), a man about my age walked briskly toward me, saying, “Hi doc, I’m sorry to interrupt you but can I ask a personal question?” My mind jumped to: where’s the rash? Instead, he continued, “It’s about my wife. She was admitted to the labour ward for an induction today, but now they’re sending her back to the antepartum ward because she isn’t having contractions.” (The labour ward has a strict no visitors policy, which also means no husbands.Throughout the rest of the hospital, visitors are only allowed for two hour-long periods each day.)  He went on to tell me about the recent course of his wife’s pregnancy, and I was becoming curious about what the “personal question” would be. After a few minutes, he asked simply, “Do you think she’ll be okay? Do you think the baby will be okay

After a couple of weeks of rounds with "the Zvandasara firm" (they refer to teams of doctors as firms, which makes me feel like I'm in a John Grisham novel) and delivering babies with the midwives, Dave and I are hitting our stride and understanding (at least at a basic level) how things work here. We continue to be amazed by the number of babies born at Harare Central Hospital every single day, and we are relishing the opportunities and experiences we’re gaining. {Me with a baby I just delivered and dressed in a very warm outfit!} Although it is no surprise that there is significant poverty in Zimbabwe (after all, it is a developing nation ), I have been struck by the dramatic ways in which the scarcity of jobs and resources affect people’s health. A recurring theme in gynecology clinic is: woman diagnosed with cancer (or probable cancer) a year ago, did not have the recommended treatment at that time because of inability to pay for it, now returning after havi

It’s been a week since we (my fellow UVM resident, Dave, and I) arrived via a bumpy landing at Harare International Airport to start a month-long obstetrics rotation at one of Zimbabwe’s tertiary medical centers. At times cautiously navigating a foreign system and at others readily integrating into seemingly universal medical practices (daily rounds, admissions, systematic gathering of patient data), we are learning that being a doctor in Zimbabwe is in some ways unrecognizably distinct and in others comfortable, familiar.  Before I go further, I want to clarify something: throughout my preparations for this trip, I received a lot of undue praise from friends, family, and patients about how great it is that I would travel to Zimbabwe for a "medical trip," with the assumption being that I am somehow going to accomplish something great or to "save" people from death or illness. While I would love to be able to end vertical HIV transmission or to vaccinate eve

I'm in the middle of my sixth year of medical training (seventh if you count the year of public health), which at times seems like a lot and at times seems too few. It's both startling and comforting to recognize that I will never know all there is to know about medicine, no matter how long I practice or how much I study. I just hope that, in spite of occasional frustration and fatigue, I will be able maintain compassion, humility, and hope of understanding the unknown, while recognizing that there will always be some things that are unknowable. “Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous to be understood. How grass can be nourishing in the mouths of the lambs. How rivers and stones are forever in allegiance with gravity, while we ourselves dream of rising. How two hands touch and the bonds will never be broken. How people come, from delight or the scars of damage, to the comfort of a poem. Let me keep my distance, always, from those who think they have the