Disclaimer: This is a very personal view on things I have learned over the years. There is no intention to hurt anyone or any belief, custom, usage, practice or institution. Life is too short to waste time in criticizing others. No one has a monopoly on truth and the correct way. It is just one person's views on things at a particular time. I have learned that everyone evolves and should evolve. Views that one holds true at a moment may change. So will be with me. I am just writing for my younger friends if they may gain from my experience, whatever worth it may be. But they must be the judge of what is good for them for no one can choose for another human being. The only promise I make is that I will always strive to pen down what I believe in my heart to be true or worth thinking about.
It is a tough decision deciding what to do with your life. I have studied medicine, been a student leader, a career civil servant (IAS) and now a social entrepreneur and I still am searching for my right vocation. Most people don't think much about it and go with the flow - perhaps they are right. Ask my family, they go nuts when I announce that from now on I am doing some thing dramatically different. Some things I learned about my past professions follows. Parents, please don't read this. If you are reading this, it means you are interested in trying to decide what your child should do. Desist, this is strictly for the still living and unchained.
MEDICINE:
I studied medicine when I was younger. We lived all our lives in small towns of Uttar Pradesh, a state in northern India. We are two brothers and a sister. We were good at school. And like any other middle class parents of small town India, our parents wanted one son to become an engineer and the other to become a doctor. My brother, Wajahat (more sincere and hardworking than me), qualified to enter the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur; so the option was medicine. Actually, the decision was made after Board exams of class tenth, when my brother had already chosen Maths, and the fact that I got poor marks in maths - left me with medicine as the only choice. I somehow managed to clear JNMedical College, (AMU, Aligarh) exams and so studied (or tried to study) medicine.
Some years down the line, I felt completely stifled in medicine. I felt it to be too boring and excessively methodical. It is like taking a young chimpanzee and making him wear a coat and tie. The monkey will not look dignified - just ridiculous. Imagine, a young guy fond of eating, having fun and doing all sorts of things that are interesting, being asked to cut up human bodies and start learning words like anterior, posterior, temporo-mandibular joint, superior, inferior, distal, proximal, Tuberculous meningitis with Diabetes mellitus Type II, with bed sores with asterexis grade II etc etc. And all these words have meanings very different from their english meanings. Why would you not call anterior - front, posterior - back, superior - upper and inferior - lower, is a mystery I never understood.
Studying medicine is like learning to chant mantras - which you hope will solve some problem. The books are so huge that no sensible person will read them. And the intelligent of course dont read them. Instead of Grey's Anatomy, people read guide books (kunjis in Hindi) like B. D. Chourasia, which in the most exalted indian tradition, would make points about everything. Five points to mug up about the superior vena cava, six points to mug up about the mesentric blood supply etc and simple line drawings that you cannot understand or relate to in the human body but you need to simply mug up the drawing! We Indians are great about mugging up things. We learn to recite even the seventeen things that a husband needs to do. Most ofcourse, get so confused with so many different jargons, that they cease to speak. Now you know why doctors are curt.
Grey's Anatomy of course is a great book. It is best used as a dining table when you are entertaining friends. Forget about reading it. Only those with nothing to do and no friends read such books. ... imagine the people who write such huge books. I think ever year, these people must be getting the combined armies of NATO and the rest of the western World (like the Swiss Guards of the Pope) to write one page each and then getting a word processor to add anatomical terms to the writings to fill up so many pages. Like, one day (auto replaced by Superior to) I (auto replaced by Superior Mesentric Artery) was going to (auto replaced by flows into) the market (auto replaced by Duodenum)... you get the drift. Let us all appreciate the people who cut down all the trees of the world to print such books. After all, for the medical fraternity, if there are more trees, there will be less diseases and hence less business.
If you join a medical college, you will also have give up the next 16 years of your life, your health and sanity and will come out into the world used to 16 hour days and by the time you are old, bald and fat. Infact, people do not think that so and so is a good doctor unless he/she is old, ugly and completely boring. And I can promise you that you wont know much about healthcare either. If you have unfortunately been a Gold Medallist, you will know even less. When I see a Doctor's shingle with the words ' Gold Medallist' written, I run away because I am still fond of my life.
Actually, Doctors know the least about health. They know more about diseases. You will learn very little about keeping people healthy in Med School except a little in Community Medicine. You will learn to treat a few diseases if you read selectively. But yes you will learn to write a lot. It is just like Security Forces. They cant bring Security. Security Forces, history has shown, have brought wars. The more bombs you have, is likely to ensure that the other guy also has more of them. And bombs will sometime or the other explode, so having more increases, not decreases the chances of more explosions. More Hospitals is atleast correlated with more morbidity. I remember once, there was an article in the press condemning Junior Doctors' strike in the Capital, saying that three patients died on the day of the strike. What the journalist probably never knew was that 13 to 14 patients would die in each hospital each day when the Doctors were on duty. If you are interested in knowing what goes on in the world of medicine more, I will give further details. But suffice it to say, that if you have the twinkle in your eyes , have friends and you are young, please stay away.
Seriously speaking, Doctors are also good people. Many of them certainly are. But yes, medicine is excruciatingly boring. One day, I'll write about what I did in the 8 years in Med School to make it more interesting. Of course, not all of my teachers appreciated. And because many of the Doctors coming out of med schools are still boring, I guess I didn't entirely succeed when I tried to replace the teaching of anatomy and biochemistry with classes on how to call strikes or how to wade through the muck filled front side pool in cold winter nights (I didnt do that, I merely taught - Najam, my roomie used to give such demos).
But I am happy to note that my efforts didnt go unnoticed. The Ministry has reduced the teaching of anat, biochem & physio to 1 year from 1 1/2. It will be good when they introduce quota for beautiful teachers (like SA- no not Sabahat Azim.... the old boys will know) in Med Schools. Maybe when I am the Health Minister, I can introduce legislation. Women, especially beautiful women, please vote for me.
Next time I will talk about Government and some experiences I have cherished.
It is a tough decision deciding what to do with your life. I have studied medicine, been a student leader, a career civil servant (IAS) and now a social entrepreneur and I still am searching for my right vocation. Most people don't think much about it and go with the flow - perhaps they are right. Ask my family, they go nuts when I announce that from now on I am doing some thing dramatically different. Some things I learned about my past professions follows. Parents, please don't read this. If you are reading this, it means you are interested in trying to decide what your child should do. Desist, this is strictly for the still living and unchained.
MEDICINE:
I studied medicine when I was younger. We lived all our lives in small towns of Uttar Pradesh, a state in northern India. We are two brothers and a sister. We were good at school. And like any other middle class parents of small town India, our parents wanted one son to become an engineer and the other to become a doctor. My brother, Wajahat (more sincere and hardworking than me), qualified to enter the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur; so the option was medicine. Actually, the decision was made after Board exams of class tenth, when my brother had already chosen Maths, and the fact that I got poor marks in maths - left me with medicine as the only choice. I somehow managed to clear JNMedical College, (AMU, Aligarh) exams and so studied (or tried to study) medicine.
Some years down the line, I felt completely stifled in medicine. I felt it to be too boring and excessively methodical. It is like taking a young chimpanzee and making him wear a coat and tie. The monkey will not look dignified - just ridiculous. Imagine, a young guy fond of eating, having fun and doing all sorts of things that are interesting, being asked to cut up human bodies and start learning words like anterior, posterior, temporo-mandibular joint, superior, inferior, distal, proximal, Tuberculous meningitis with Diabetes mellitus Type II, with bed sores with asterexis grade II etc etc. And all these words have meanings very different from their english meanings. Why would you not call anterior - front, posterior - back, superior - upper and inferior - lower, is a mystery I never understood.
Studying medicine is like learning to chant mantras - which you hope will solve some problem. The books are so huge that no sensible person will read them. And the intelligent of course dont read them. Instead of Grey's Anatomy, people read guide books (kunjis in Hindi) like B. D. Chourasia, which in the most exalted indian tradition, would make points about everything. Five points to mug up about the superior vena cava, six points to mug up about the mesentric blood supply etc and simple line drawings that you cannot understand or relate to in the human body but you need to simply mug up the drawing! We Indians are great about mugging up things. We learn to recite even the seventeen things that a husband needs to do. Most ofcourse, get so confused with so many different jargons, that they cease to speak. Now you know why doctors are curt.
Grey's Anatomy of course is a great book. It is best used as a dining table when you are entertaining friends. Forget about reading it. Only those with nothing to do and no friends read such books. ... imagine the people who write such huge books. I think ever year, these people must be getting the combined armies of NATO and the rest of the western World (like the Swiss Guards of the Pope) to write one page each and then getting a word processor to add anatomical terms to the writings to fill up so many pages. Like, one day (auto replaced by Superior to) I (auto replaced by Superior Mesentric Artery) was going to (auto replaced by flows into) the market (auto replaced by Duodenum)... you get the drift. Let us all appreciate the people who cut down all the trees of the world to print such books. After all, for the medical fraternity, if there are more trees, there will be less diseases and hence less business.
If you join a medical college, you will also have give up the next 16 years of your life, your health and sanity and will come out into the world used to 16 hour days and by the time you are old, bald and fat. Infact, people do not think that so and so is a good doctor unless he/she is old, ugly and completely boring. And I can promise you that you wont know much about healthcare either. If you have unfortunately been a Gold Medallist, you will know even less. When I see a Doctor's shingle with the words ' Gold Medallist' written, I run away because I am still fond of my life.
Actually, Doctors know the least about health. They know more about diseases. You will learn very little about keeping people healthy in Med School except a little in Community Medicine. You will learn to treat a few diseases if you read selectively. But yes you will learn to write a lot. It is just like Security Forces. They cant bring Security. Security Forces, history has shown, have brought wars. The more bombs you have, is likely to ensure that the other guy also has more of them. And bombs will sometime or the other explode, so having more increases, not decreases the chances of more explosions. More Hospitals is atleast correlated with more morbidity. I remember once, there was an article in the press condemning Junior Doctors' strike in the Capital, saying that three patients died on the day of the strike. What the journalist probably never knew was that 13 to 14 patients would die in each hospital each day when the Doctors were on duty. If you are interested in knowing what goes on in the world of medicine more, I will give further details. But suffice it to say, that if you have the twinkle in your eyes , have friends and you are young, please stay away.
Seriously speaking, Doctors are also good people. Many of them certainly are. But yes, medicine is excruciatingly boring. One day, I'll write about what I did in the 8 years in Med School to make it more interesting. Of course, not all of my teachers appreciated. And because many of the Doctors coming out of med schools are still boring, I guess I didn't entirely succeed when I tried to replace the teaching of anatomy and biochemistry with classes on how to call strikes or how to wade through the muck filled front side pool in cold winter nights (I didnt do that, I merely taught - Najam, my roomie used to give such demos).
But I am happy to note that my efforts didnt go unnoticed. The Ministry has reduced the teaching of anat, biochem & physio to 1 year from 1 1/2. It will be good when they introduce quota for beautiful teachers (like SA- no not Sabahat Azim.... the old boys will know) in Med Schools. Maybe when I am the Health Minister, I can introduce legislation. Women, especially beautiful women, please vote for me.
Next time I will talk about Government and some experiences I have cherished.
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