Never Lose Hope

It has been uncommon for me to write commentaries of late, in part because there seems to be minimal feedback from the internet community. In my earlier years of web blogging, I used iWeb and it facilitated readers adding comments for feedback. I would never wish to go to a social networking type style, such as with FaceBook, in that it tends to breed short, abrupt thought processes that do not have premises, reasoning, and conclusions demonstrated. It is meaningless prattle. No, even if I love you, I’m not interested in your kid graduating from pre-school, or where you went out to eat last night, that is, unless these events have a significant meaning in your life, and you offer an explanation as to how these events were significant life-events.
Hope. It is one of the three Christian virtues. Faith, hope, and love. Just as we don’t wish to ever cause another person to lose love or faith (in Christ), we never wish to cause a person to lose hope. But, hope in what? I am on rare occasions accused of causing my patients to lose hope. Generally, I try to tell the patient the exact truth. If I don’t, they’ll get it over the internet. I feel that integrity is a foremost virtue for a physician. I have heard many doctors argue otherwise. Dr. Lauren Pancratz argues vehemently that if a lie (deviation from the whole truth) contributes to the betterment of a patient, then we should lie to our patient. I disagree entirely. Truth must be presented graciously and skillfully, but it must be presented all the same.
I see many patients that come from other doctors, mostly medical oncologists, who were never told the significance of their cancer. For many medical oncologists, hope in “the system” must be preserved. Perhaps much of this is self-serving. I find that only 5% of patients do not wish to know the truth of their condition. Most patients welcome it, often are relieved, and are happy that they can better understand their condition and make long-term plans with better knowledge of their condition.
There is a balance that physicians struggle with. If there is a reasonable expectation that the health care system can significantly improve their condition, then I will strive to be positive, even if the short-term outcome is expected to be dismal. In one sense, there is always hope, but that hope depends on the objectives of the physician/patient encounter. If the expectation is to prolong life no matter how miserable that life might be, the treatment options are going to be different than if the objective is to simply offer comfort measures. Both contain hope that the therapy will work, but the outcome expectations are different. Thus, in a real sense, hope is never lost.
The source of hope is my greatest concern. Patients usually do well or do poorly in spite of me. Health care professionals have less control of a situation than they would like to believe. To trust that the health care professional will provide health is a misdirection of one’s trust. It is always a pleasure when a patient comes to me, realizing that only God can give them hope, and trust in Him is of greatest value. It is a pity that so many devout Christians have a seriously displaced hope, trusting entirely in the physician, and not seeing that even the best physicians have feet of clay. Balance is important. To ignore the physicians that God provides is unwise. To expect that physicians always know best is also unwise. Many Christians run to Hookey-Pookey medicine (Chiropractors/Naturopaths) feeling that they are more “natural” or “Christian” than mainline medical practice — that is also highly unwise.
We don’t want our patients to lose hope. We wish for them to have the correct source for their hope. We wish them to have realistic expectations. We wish them never to give up. We wish them to be able to change expectations when the facts suggest it. Mostly we wish them to maintain the three Christian virtues, faith, hope, and love, up to the very last breath that they take.

Tags: Healthcare