ideals

Bismillah ar Rahman ar Raheem
In the name of Allah, Most Merciful Most Gracious

Each week we'll have a seminar where we'll discuss a case, and at the end of the case study, there will some ethical questions. Latest one is about a dengue patient, with DSS. Potentially fatal,bbut alhamdulillah she recovered, and she wanted to claim her insurance, but in the agreement, dengue fever was not stated, so she couldn't claim it. She needed the money to pay the bills (our lecturer estimated the cost of about RM80 000) and she's a 4th year medical student. 1 more year and she don't have enough money for her fees as she needed to pay for her medical bills.
She came to see the doctor (me, in that simulated case) and asked to not state dengue in the report.
So, what should I do?

I kind of interested in my lecturer's comment.
He said, we tried to teach you about moral and ethics, but in this kind of world, we can never run away from the issue of money.

I remember in my adolescent years,
I imagined a life without money.
Money is considered evil. Everything is free, no charge.
No need to do business, we just give services to one another.
Hungry, just go to any restaurant and eat. The restaurant owner don't have to pay the bills, cuz he can give food to the water/electricity provider, or anyone else can. Doctors help to cure everyone for free. No expensive medical bills no one can't afford. Garbage collectors help everyone by keeping the place clean. Everyone help each other, no charge at all.

I kept on thinking, why can't everybody just understand that we can compliment each other and we don't need money to pay people. An ideal world of mine. heh. Sungguh tak matang punya pemikiran.

I thought that everyone is selfish. Everything should come with a price. Doctors learnt medicine for at least 5 hard years, and garbage collectors don't need such education, so how is that fair to get no pay for the service? Just for an example. Everyone thinks that they've worked hard for themselves. To gain something
for themselves. Not thinking about others.

Remember a quote I saw written on a piece of Post-It in a friend's room.
"We live simply so that others can simply live".
Catchy, and perhaps there are some truths in it.
We often make things complicated for ourselves (read: myself) and end up making others suffer as well, with or without us realizing it.

I still do wonder if such a world could exist.
A world without greed and selfishness.

And oh yeah, we were often provoked to think of emotional factors in making medical decisions. Lots of methods and scoring systems were designed to help us make objective decisions rather than subjective decisions. A way to exclude emotions as an influence.
E.g. the concept of triage. Triage = sorting out. Patients are sorted out according to the severity of their illness and different scoring system calculates who should doctors see first, and avoiding things like "just because this fella is a relative of mine, so he should be seen first" kinda thing. Often a dilemma for doctors, especially when relatives yang persoalkan. Still, I don't think we humans can run away from having emotions. We are not robots, executing commands based on purely facts and figures. It's a blessing that we're given emotions, even bad ones, cuz we can't see the good unless we know the bad.
And again, money issues. Menteri, VVVVIPs always get to be seen first. why? money, status, power. how fair can things be?
Happens all the time, as said by my lecturer.

So, I wonder when and how can things change.
People get advantages just because they have money and power,
the more needy ones are left behind.
I hate that kind of mentality, that we need to respect someone just because they are have a title stuck to their name, just because they are "someone".
Well, my definition of "someone" and "respectable ones" are not the same.
I pray that in the future when I do start my career, I won't be the one with the dollar, RM, pound sterling or whatever currency signs in my eyes down to my heart.

Well, this is the world we're living in.
So, whaddaya say?

with love,
~hS