To cure sometimes, to relieve often, to comfort always.

 

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As the year draws to a close we once again gasp at the seemingly increasing speed of life as it zips past us. For some, life is becoming more and more like a YouTube video, an Instagram or a tweet: rich in content but devoid of genuine feelings. Many would lament that compassion and empathy - the things that makes us human - are now increasingly relegated to the tips of our fingers: clicking on emoticons, giving a thumbs up or down or participating in yet an- other poll. As healers - supposedly - compassion and empathy lie at the very foundation of our existence. It would do us good if we can pause a while and ponder on this.

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The ‘hand touching the heart’ in our Ministry of Health logo emphasizes the value of compassion and empathy in every doctor-patient relationship - regardless of skin color, belief or social status.

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Having said that, the steady increase of studies quoting the decline of empathy in medical students and doctors has become a huge concern in medical education. Although some of these studies have been challenged for its study designs, it would be unfortunate for us educators to be complacent in the delusion that empathy does not decline during training. The increasing workload, burnout and diverse patient demographics may have contributed to this decline and yetwe have so little time to reflect on our patient contact.

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Morse et al (2008) in his preliminary study analyzed transcripts of doctors talking to lung cancer patients. He found that doctors only responded to 10% of ‘empathic opportunities’ that occurred in consultations. Of course, more studies are needed before we can say that we are this ‘cold’. But it is important to further research on how we can improve because compassion and empathy are not replaceable by robots or AI. What’s interesting, empathy has movedfrom ‘soft’ to ‘hard’ science through neuroscientific research.

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Having ‘Compassionate Professional’ as its motto, the School of Medical Sciences USM has always accentuated values in nurturing our future doctors. Thus, in this issue we feature an esteemed guest author, Prof. Dr. Zabidi Azhar Mohd Hussin on Imparting Values to Students in Clinical Teaching. We also feature an infographic summarizing 8 reviews on empathy, students’ reflections on volunteerism, lessons learnt from an overseas attachment, graduates’ insights and a special tribute to Prof. Dr. Hasnan Jaafar. We would like to highlight an inspiring post by Dr. Yeoh Boon Seng on how waiting for housemanship has led him to the discovery of ‘unique tea leaves combination’.

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I’ll stop here with the usual - sit back, relax and enjoy your reading.

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