We’ve talked about palliative care. We’ve talked about hospice care. We’ve discussed the stages of grief and how each of us feel differently about the loss of our loved ones. We’ve even talked a little about how the nurses, the angels who took care of us in the chemo rooms and on the hospital floors, dealt with the loss of their patients. But have we ever really thought about our doctors? So many of us have built relationships with our oncologists over the years, because so often, cancer care isn’t just a few weeks, but many months, many years sometimes and our doctors become more than medical advisers. They become friends and a part of our families.
It’s almost four years since Leroy is gone and I count his oncologist and his wife among my cherished friends. These are special people.
But how did Leroy’s team of docs feel when he passed away? Did they grieve his loss?
Today, a study released in Archives of Internal Medicine, finds that doctors do experience grief. The professional taboo on the emotion also appears to weigh heavily on the doctors and in some cases impacts the quality of care they provide. This study took place from 2010 to 2011 in three Canadian hospitals. A wide range of ages, sex, and ethnicity was used in the study as well as experience in cancer world.
According to the results, some oncologists were ashamed to admit they felt grief. Some hid their feelings of grief because showing emotion was considered a sign of weakness. Leeat Granek, one of the health psychologists involved in the study, wrote that many of the doctors used in the study, said that this was the first time they had been asked questions about grief surrounding the loss of patients.
I’m sad to learn about this study. Who’s checking on the heart beat of our oncologists? These wizards of the cancer wars get wounded too. They need time to feel, just like all of us.
Some one, please, open up an “understanding room” for the grieving doctor.
June 1, 2012 @ 9:18 am
Someone told me that my husband’s oncologist prays daily for all his patients. While he is a very calm person, he clearly rejoices when a patient makes progress, but in a very quiet way. There is no doubt in my mind that he has shed tears over patients that he has not been able to cure because there is that loving quality about him.
May 31, 2012 @ 9:41 pm
When all the guessing was over-after weeks of uncertainty-that first doctor came in to say what we didn’t want to hear.Someone else was out in the hall-I don’t know who.I just thought it was odd that the doctor took a chair-I didn’t like it at all. I was sitting on her raised,adjustable hospital bed and after the prognosis-I just leaned over and rested my head on her chest.She put her hand on my shoulder and the three of us just sat quietly. We didn’t hide our tears.
May 30, 2012 @ 9:06 pm
Fabulous post and I’m so thankful you brought up this subject. Today I visited with my oncologist – he’s wonderful . . . wonderful because he’s so openly caring for his patients. The best doctors wear their hearts on their sleeve and dare to connect with those they help. Yes, they deserve an understanding room, and the ability to admit to the grief.
Thank you again for raising this subject.
May 29, 2012 @ 7:50 pm
I would feel better knowing they have feelings and allow themselves to grieve than not. If they didn’t have hearts I doubt they would have become oncologists in the first place. Jim’s oncologist had a personal reason to specialize in oncology…his father had died from prostate cancer. I think patients and caregivers should have a part in the education of physicians because it is not ALL about the science.
May 29, 2012 @ 5:17 pm
Well said Mo! It has often struck me that oncologists are always walking a tightrope with their patients. Some do seem to get better and go into remission and sometimes a prolonged remission. Most fight the fight with all of their will and the oncologist uses all of the tools available but often to no avail. The pediatric oncologsts are the ones I am in awe of…..dealing with the toddlers, adolescents and teens and many times seeing them pass away from their disease. This strikes me as just so difficult to endure for them but yet they soldier on trying their best for the next patient. Surely it must take a toll. I wonder……..do they see a balance for the ones that survive and live a full life for the ones they were unable to save. May God continue to give them the strength, knowledge, compassion and hope to do what they do each day in the fight.
May 29, 2012 @ 4:58 pm
The irony is that what is supposed to help ensure that doctors maintain sufficient distance to think clear-headedly affects care negatively.
There is a reason we have hearts and have been endowed with the ability to feel.