After completing the 2021 Pre-Med hospice program, I would like to emphasize how important this program is not only to our medical school applications, but to our personal perspectives and experience with death. This program provides the unique opportunity for students to develop a stronger understanding and more peaceful relationship with palliative care and death. Few pre-med students get the chance to expand their perspective by directly interacting with hospice patients. This program has opened my eyes and allowed me to learn how to properly care for hospice patients, as well as myself. In the medical field, death is viewed almost as a taboo occurrence, even though it is one of the most natural things in a lifecycle. I believe I will be a better doctor coming out of this program because it has taught me to listen to my patients’ needs more, and make sure they feel heard and comforted. Hospice teaches it’s volunteers to remove that stigma around death and dying through multiple reflection readings, anecdotes and discussions (as well as patient visits outside of 2020). Specifically, Prompt 1.1 and Being Mortal has shown me that many doctors have this unspoken fear and anxiety around doing everything they possibly can to prevent patients from dying. They fight this at all costs because death is associated with being a bad physician or “failure” even though this is not always the case. Sometimes patients do not want to go through every treatment or drug trial because often they are painful and exhausting, and decrease quality of life. A good physician will know when to stop at the desire of their patients’ wishes and point them to palliative care which can be just as effective in giving the best possible quality care in their last moments of life. After reading Prompt 5.1 an important theme that stuck to me was the “…understanding death as inevitable is necessary to appreciate the meaning and beauty of life.” Upon self reflection and discussion of this, I am able to appreciate the time we have on earth much more because I have a better understanding and relationship with death. I believe that this will only benefit me while I practice medicine because I can help provide patients and families with knowledge and comfort.
Additionally, in Prompt 4.3, Robert Horvitz states that our cells understand the consequences of overstaying our welcome, and that these consequences are sometimes more scary and painful than death itself. I think that the Pre-Med Hospice experience has helped me observe the consequences of outlasting one’s welcome because you really need to listen to the patient’s wishes and desires. Comfort and compassion are the two biggest things that, as a hospice volunteer, I can provide to my patients, and take away the fear that comes with dying.
I want to end off on a quote from Sunita Puri, M.D that I believe reflects my personal growth and understanding from this program over the semester, “…change and impermanence are not just spiritual tenets but laws of nature — ones that I’d struggled against and had been taught to ignore throughout much of my medical training.” I used to be very closed minded towards death and that it directly tied to failure, when in reality I have learned that it is in fact a law of nature. Everyone experiences it, however most medical schools teach how to avoid it, and do not address the option of palliative care. Now my greater connection and understanding of death and dying will positively impact the kind of physician I will be.