Dis-Ease
In reading Caroline Myss’ work “The Anatomy of the Spirit”, on page 37, there is a break in the word disease to accommodate paragraph spacing. Dis-ease. As I sat there staring at this word that in large part defines my professional life, I began to think about its meaning in an entirely new way. A few months later, I found it again in “Coming to Our Senses” by Jon Kabat-Zinn. Dis-ease. This time, an entire chapter was dedicated to the root of this word. Spending the last 20 years in the study and practice of medicine, disease has been presented as a tangible ailment that has a physicality to it. Something that as a physician, I am charged with diagnosing and providing appropriate treatment. Dis-ease implies something different. Dis-ease: an absence of ease, a loss of harmony, a lack of synchrony across a system.
Three years ago, preparing to recertify for the American Board for Internal Medicine, I became very frustrated by my training. I realized I had been molded into a thoughtful diagnostician, but all I had been given to treat patients was a proverbial prescription pad. The more I reviewed the mountain of material, I felt like a dispenser of Band-Aids in pill form: this is the diagnosis, here is the pill to treat it. For me, there is and, I am confident, always will be a beautiful art in discovering diagnoses, in hearing patient’s stories and in sitting with them in times of joy and sorrow, but I felt driven to find something more to offer patients.
In my frustration I began to search for how to educate myself outside of conventional treatment. More importantly, how to reach beyond diagnosis to discover what has happened with patients from a physical, emotional and spiritual standpoint that has led them to the moment they sit with me. My search lead to Integrative Medicine which teaches providers to do just this. After a year of training in this expansive field, my practice and personal life have changed in ways that I would never have predicted. Reading the fragmented word “dis-ease”, I realized that it defines what I want to help patients discover and heal.
How do we turn the tide of dis-ease back to a system at ease? What are we doing to cause our systems to be out of sync? Discovery of this answer takes a partnership. It is not about going to the doctor, receiving a diagnosis and leaving with a pill. It is tedious work on the part of both the physician and the patient. Work that can change the course of someone’s entire life if put to task in a manner that is focused and committed. It is more than a 10-minute visit. It is physicians taking back their profession, demanding time with patients to deliver personalized, quality care. It is more than saying a diet needs to change, exercise needs to happen, sleep needs to be prioritized, relationships need to heal. It is about focusing on ourselves and how we are living our lives.
Caroline Myss describes this focus as not egocentric but purposeful for personal discovery and ultimate healing. As a society, we have become accustomed to looking outside ourselves for the answers. How do we help one another make the shift to look inside? We should know our bodies better than anyone else. We have the ability to care for ourselves in the most meaningful ways, but we have to dig deep to make the discoveries in order to start that process. By no means is this an easy or quick fix. Quite possibly, it is the most difficult work someone will do and if done right, it will be lifelong. So, let’s get to it! Patients and physicians alike, let us come together to put our systems back at ease.
With a grateful heart and mind,
Alli