Humanism, respect, understanding and compassion are at the very core of being a medical professional. From a very young age I knew that I wanted to be a medical professional. The science behind medicine definitely intrigued me, but it was the particular bond with a patient during care that intrigued me the most. in the coming years I found myself gravitating toward volunteer positions and community outreach programs.
After my first year of medical school I volunteered at Banos Hospital in Ecuador. The hospital had limited supplies and resources, and the community itself was impoverished. I understood the hardships that the citizens faced, but I was excited to wake every morning to help serve them in the emergency room, the operating room, or even serve as a translator for visiting American physicians. Although my Spanish was very broken, the patients' smiles and enduring chuckles at my grammatical errors were a perfect example fo why I wanted to volunteer in Ecuador. Even in a different language, I was able to realize my ambition to simply help care for patients. I shared my compassion with the people and their families who graciously invited me to live with them for a month.
Once I became a third year medical student, I could not wait until I was able to see patients and be able to identify with them, help them, and, most importantly (to me), just simply take a few minutes of my day every day to find our something new about my patient. Multiple patients have told me how much they appreciate me just talkign to them for even 10 minutes because they feel as though they have no one else with whom to talk. One homeless patient informed me that he had shared more with me in our 30 minute conversation than he had shared with anyone in many years simply because I lent an open ear.
Matthew Howard, UICOM-P Class of 2012
(excerpted from Gold Humanism essay)
