Originally published in the Opinion page of the Herald-Zeitung, January 20, 2024.
The email was as startling as it was unexpected. My wife and I had received it on our computers simultaneously: the family physician we had enjoyed for more than a decade had left the consortium of which she was a member. Nothing more could be learned nor offered. We were asked to call in to be assigned another caregiver and so remain in the consortium’s membership. Simple as that. Swap out one doctor for one we had never met nor knew anything about. Without exaggerating here, we were both traumatized by this abrupt shift in our medical lives.
When we had this physician highly recommended to us years ago, I waited for 5 months for a vacancy to open before I was accepted into her practice. My wife waited another 3 months before she was invited to be a patient. We counted our lucky stars for several reasons.
We had never had a family doctor who listened as closely as she did, who gave us all the time in the world, as if we were her only patients. In reality, her schedule was always booked solid. But when the door closed and it was just the doctor and me, I felt that, yes, this person saw me as a full and complex individual, not as another unit carrying the label: patient.
Another important advantage we were to learn over the years: she was thoroughly connected to a network of other doctors in New Braunfels. My eye doctor, a superior fellow in his field, was her recommendation. My Ear, Nose and Throat doctor was also recommended by her, and by extension, the young doctor who introduced me into the world of hearing aids.
Our former doctor networked for her patients and made sage recommendations because she knew us so well. Knowing our medical histories, she was able on more than one occasion to suggest cease taking certain medications I no longer needed, based on physical exams and my history.
She also offered short tests for memory loss, tests for depression, anxiety, level of life satisfaction, for meaning in life. She treated the whole person, not the individual who happened to have a body.
But her best medication, which she doled out generously, either in person or on a zoom call, was her gift of listening, holding back professional advice until she was sure she had grasped a more nuanced sense of which physical, psychic and emotional health I conveyed in our conversations.
Over time, and a bit beleaguered as a sole physician in her practice, she joined a consortium of doctors in order to have a larger network of colleagues with whom to consult on various patients. All to the good.
Then suddenly, she was gone. Without a trace. It felt at that moment for my wife and me that a close friend of many years had died; she was someone in whom we confided intimate details of our lives that besides us, no one else was privy to. As it should be. Confidentiality is another of those medical absolutes based on trust that is nurtured between caregiver and patient.
As we age into our late 70s, the relationship we had with our beloved doctor-- and many of you reading this know the experience—was suddenly over; we felt this dramatic loss with great sadness. I think the uncertainty of what happened to her is most haunting. The psychic and emotional cost we continue to feel as it grows more acute, rather than diminishes, is a major adjustment in our lives.
All of us know the priceless treasure of a caring caregiver. It goes way beyond skin deep.