Of Medical Missions and Physicians

*personal photo used in this article

I participated in a medical mission yesterday and realized that there are numerous reasons why all doctors, not just the young ones, need to join one every so often. Here are two of them:

• It reminds us why chose this field.
  • We provide medical service stripped off material returns. We opt to skip meals in order to do something that we genuinely love. It is our calling to practice medicine.
• It liberates us from defensive medicine.
  • We learn to trust our history taking and physical examination, the two components that get a physician to a medical diagnosis 90% of the time. We do not subject patients to unnecessary ancillaries just to avoid lawsuits.

For the MIMS community, what are some of the things you have learned with deeper reflection on medical missions you have joined?