Health care does not provide compassion for
the sick. We have few choices when we need care:
Go to the hospital emergency department and
wait hours with other sick people. Worry for six or seven
hours, and then see an overworked doctor who tells you to go
home or see a specialist.
Go to a walk-in clinic where you are lucky to
have a doctor see you for five minutes. The doctor slumps into
a chair and says "see your GP." He doesn't have time to even
take your blood pressure.
Go to a specialist, if you are lucky to get
an appointment. You could wait for six months, even a
year.
We need health-care workers to talk and
comfort the sick while we wait for treatment. The doctors don't
have time. We need people to work with us as we face illness
and depression.
Terry Fielding
Garson