Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-06-04
THE DOCTORS JOB
By H. Addington Bruce

BY II. AddlngtOn bruce
FTEN people have said to me, or writ
IL ten:
~ II have no confidence in doctors.
They do not know their job. They are guess
ing most of the time, and when they get re-
suits it is more by good luck than by any
thing else"
| People who talk like this, you may depend
on it, have either been unfortunate in their
choice of doctors or have gone to doctors
expecting quick cure, though afflicted with
maladies requiring careful study to deter
mine their true nature.
There are misfits in medicine, just as there
are misfts in every other field of human en-
deavor. That cannot be denied, Men I'M
dertake the art of healing who have no apti-
tude whatever for this vitality important
work. There even are mercenary, money
grubbing doctors, more intent on the fees
they can gain than on the benefits they may
bestow.
But such men are dishonorable exceptions
The great majority Of doctors are distin-
guished by eagerness to serve and willing
ness to sacrifice self for others. And the
great majority Know their job so we'll that
they appreciate, as the layman cannot, It's
great completely and enormous difficulties.
If, much Of the time, they are indeed re-
duced to guessing" this is chiefly due to the
pressure of the Impotence of patients and
the need Of making an effort to give relief
from suffering with the utmost dispatch.
The supreme difficulty confronting every
doctor is that similar symptoms may be pro-
duced by very different diseases, and that
very different symptoms may develop from
the same disease. Take, for example, the
single symptom of an intense chronic or fire.
quently recurrent headache.
This may be caused by nothing more than
neurotic over-attention to headache orig1-
nally caused, perhaps, by digestive disorder.
BY keeping the attention fixed on the throb-
bling head the ache has been made persistent.
But there may be no neurotic element
present. The headache may be symptom
of unrelieved eyestrain, or of some infection
in the nasal sinuses, or of ear infection,
or Of glandular trouble.
Or yet again, headache severe enough and
prolonged enough to send it's victim to doc
tor may be sign of anaemia, Of malaria, OF
kidney disease, of syphilis, of hardening Of
the arteries. or even of tumor on the brain.
Usually, to be sure, there are attending
symptoms helping the doctor to say just
what is the headaches cause. But often he
must hesitate-unless the patients insistence
compels him to make a "snap diagnosis" or,
in other words, compels him to guess
Sometimes the "guess" may be sadly
astray. Certainly. however, this is far less
likely to be the case than it would be If the
guessing were done by some "healer" I'M
learned in the science and unframed in the
practice of medicine.
Whatever medicines shortcomings, that Is
to say, logic dictates resort in time Of Illness
to those most familiar with the workings Of
he human organism.
And logic also dictates respect, not scorn,
for the medical man who, presented with
some battling case, admits that ne needs
time and possibly the assistance of special
lists to answer the riddle it raises.
Copyright. 1921, by the Associated Newspa-
pers.)