Michael W

Michael W, Kahn, M.D., writing in the New England Journal of Medicine, tells of a lesson in mindfulness  — and the importance of crocuses as spring approaches — he received as a young and harried resident  from an old lady and her also old  and courtly Boston Brahmin physician.

”{The doctor} would have had a good chuckle over his gin and tonic at my making such a fuss about his offhand remark. He would correctly say he was just being human, possibly adding that — in the words of a song from his youth — he was accentuating the positive. True enough; and in an era when many physicians and patients alike bemoan the lack of time in healthcare for ‘being human,’ should doctors voluntarily add to their responsibilities the task of promoting mindfulness in themselves and their patients?”

Yes, obviously.