2:56 AM
Please take a look at this short video from Danielle Ofri, author of What Doctors Feel.
A perceptive quote from her:
"As doctors, if we fail, it’s not something outside of us; it is us. We are the error. The shame is so powerful that most doctors will never come forward about an error. I think the socialization of doctors makes it extremely hard for us to admit a mistake. We tend to pick perfectionists as medical students, knowing that the medical system is not for the faint of heart. Then they’re trained to be perfectionist doctors. There’s no place for a 'good enough" doctor. You’re either excellent or terrible."
This is a awful burden, one reinforced by the medical education process, especially during many residency programs. I wonder how to get those involved in medical education to understand that this attitude contributes to patient harm.
Thanks to Gene Lindsey for pointing out the article and video. He also sends us to view some thoughts from Justin Locke, author of Principles of Applied Stupidity:
We all are imperfect of course, but our society is intolerant of such things, and demands that we conceal it. Doctors are under particular cultural pressure to “be perfect.” But when it comes to medical error, shame energy can actually blind the mind to reality. The ongoing pretense that we “don’t make mistakes” is a leading cause of why the mistakes we make don’t get acknowledged, much less fixed.
Our immersion in what I call “smartism” starts early and is taught systematically. We attach enormous shame (i.e., inner-directed personal loathing of self) to failing tests in school, and enormous pressure to get into Harvard. This is a flawed system. There is no big victory for the “A” students; they start to think that their social acceptance is based solely on superstar performance, and they become fractured spirits, becoming human doings instead of human beings. Instead of a sense of social teamwork, shame energy, i.e., our intolerance of the reality of our imperfections, puts us in an unwinnable bitter battle to always be better than someone else. No matter how well you do in such a battle, you lose, for in the end, you do not have community acceptance, the glorious opposite of the dark energy of shame.
A perceptive quote from her:
"As doctors, if we fail, it’s not something outside of us; it is us. We are the error. The shame is so powerful that most doctors will never come forward about an error. I think the socialization of doctors makes it extremely hard for us to admit a mistake. We tend to pick perfectionists as medical students, knowing that the medical system is not for the faint of heart. Then they’re trained to be perfectionist doctors. There’s no place for a 'good enough" doctor. You’re either excellent or terrible."
This is a awful burden, one reinforced by the medical education process, especially during many residency programs. I wonder how to get those involved in medical education to understand that this attitude contributes to patient harm.
Thanks to Gene Lindsey for pointing out the article and video. He also sends us to view some thoughts from Justin Locke, author of Principles of Applied Stupidity:
We all are imperfect of course, but our society is intolerant of such things, and demands that we conceal it. Doctors are under particular cultural pressure to “be perfect.” But when it comes to medical error, shame energy can actually blind the mind to reality. The ongoing pretense that we “don’t make mistakes” is a leading cause of why the mistakes we make don’t get acknowledged, much less fixed.
Our immersion in what I call “smartism” starts early and is taught systematically. We attach enormous shame (i.e., inner-directed personal loathing of self) to failing tests in school, and enormous pressure to get into Harvard. This is a flawed system. There is no big victory for the “A” students; they start to think that their social acceptance is based solely on superstar performance, and they become fractured spirits, becoming human doings instead of human beings. Instead of a sense of social teamwork, shame energy, i.e., our intolerance of the reality of our imperfections, puts us in an unwinnable bitter battle to always be better than someone else. No matter how well you do in such a battle, you lose, for in the end, you do not have community acceptance, the glorious opposite of the dark energy of shame.
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