"She has a beautiful smile. It's nice to see her smiling again." This was the last part of the background one of the other doctors gave me on a patient I was about to see. She had been through some significant marital conflict and domestic violence in the last year but seemed to be in a better place more recently. Still, when I later asked her how things were going at home, she teared up and described another trauma that had taken place not long ago. As I listened to her story, it struck me once again how limited I am in my abilities as a physician. I can treat her medical issues with pills and potions, but I can't change her husband's behavior, or her desperate plight in life. I can be a listening ear, but I can't provide the kind of support she truly needs. For that, we could only turn to the God we both seek. As we prayed together, me struggling along in Spanish, I prayed that God would intervene on her behalf, would change her husband's heart, would comfort her and give her strength.
Medicine can only do so much. It's a temporary fix to most of the problems we encounter. We can extend the length of life sometimes with things like antibiotics, we can improve the quality of life with inhalers or diuretics, but ultimately we can't change hearts with prescriptions. It leaves me wondering why God has allowed me to gain the skills I have when ultimately they seem useless in the face of real problems here. I trust that He has led me on this path for a reason, and part of the reason may be the privilege of getting to ask people intimate personal questions and knowing how to really pray for them. The glory for anything we accomplish goes to God who is the true healer of minds, hearts, and bodies.
