Doctors: We are simply the bridge between nature and our clients.
I am fascinated with finding the best metaphors to describe what doctors do, and exactly what sorts of activities allow students to learn to ‘think and behave’ like doctors. Doctors as scientists, doctors as scholars etc., I find dull and too PC. Science is important, rationality more so, but the practice of medicine is called ‘practice’ for a reason. The increasing trend to attempt to redefine medicine as ‘medical science’, dermatology as ‘dermatological sciences’, even nursing as ‘nursing science’, is all about kudos and branding. I have even seen ‘hospitality sciences’, although not on a hospital menu. I think there is a rich mine to explore, looking at comparisons with the acquisition of musical expertise, with the traditional crafts and of course with the traditional professions. This quote from the chef Alain Ducasse captures something important (and avoids the ‘hospitality sciencies’ claptrap).
No geniuses have ever come from the kitchen. The world has had Pierre and Marie Curie, and Leonardo da Vinci. The former couple started a revolution against disease, advancing humanity, and the latter was a man whose genius we’re are still trying to understand. Chefs, on the other hand, are just artisans. If nature doesn’t give us vegetables, if the fisherman didn’t supply us with fish and the farmer with meat, we wouldn’t exist. We are simply the bridge between nature and our clients.
We are simply the bridge between nature and our patients.