Since childhood, it has always been one of my deepest beliefs that doctors should represent and embody the ideals of compassion and understanding, all while helping to improve the quality of life for the patients under their care. However, growing up as a minority in America I soon came to realize the image that I had percieved about a number of things including my perception of doctors was slated. My life experiences have taught me that not all physicans are ginuinely concerned about their patients, which often leads to inadquate healthcare for select groups of individuals. This problem along with the desire to help others have been one of the key motivating factors in my decision to apply to medical school and seek to become a doctor.
As a young child, I was diagnosed as mentally chanllenged. My parents were informed that I might never fully grasp the skills necessary to speak fluently and I was enrolled in a speech therapy class. After a few weeks in the class, the therapist explained that I was not mentally chanlleged. In addition, She went on to add tha fact I was acamedically gifted. I am just glad that my parents never believed the doctors diagnosis and continued to help motivate me to achieve excellence. I Often wonder/ponder have my other children were mistakely labeled and were unable to escape their tract assigned to them. .
Just recently my volunteer work at a clinic in Pembroke has provided me with a first-hand view of the hardships that a rural community faces. One incident in particular involved a new patient, and older woman, that had just been diagnosed with breast cancer. However my mentor, Dr. West, explained to me that the cancer had probably been there for ten years and had spread throughout her body. The irony of the situation arose form the fact that before his clinic opened, she had been going to the sole doctor's office in the community for ten years and the physican assitant she had been seen had never asked her if she was recieving yearly breast exams.