2013 humanism in medicine essay contest: Third place: The good doctor

摘要

A clean shaven face! He will be caned for sure, I thought. Men always grew their beards and women always covered their faces in public—that was the Taliban law in my village and throughout Afghanistan. How could this man ignore the Taliban and escape the ever present gaze of the morality police who walked around with long sticks and lashed at citizens for the slightest infraction? This man, dressed in traditional peran and tumbon (shirt and pants) clothing, walked with an unassuming gait. The villagers called him kharijee (outsider). I came to know him as the good doctor from America doing volunteer work with landmine victims. We worked together for a British nongovernmental organization; I assisted him with patients and translation. The organization was one of a handful still operating in Afghanistan; most others were harassed out of or banned from the country.He was an orthopedic surgeon, a middle-aged man with slightly graying hair. Fit and trim, he looked younger than his age. He spoke with a soft voice full of confidence yet humble to a fault. Always polite, he exuded compassion through his still blue eyes. He left a busy practice in the States, traveling to this remote village long forgotten by the world to mend broken bones and, as it turns out, a broken soul.During the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, 1979-1989, many roads and villages were mined. Once placed, antipersonnel mines can last up to 50 years. Long after the Soviet conflict ended, the danger of mines persisted. One particular mine, descriptively called the butterfly because of its shape and size, caused the most killing and maiming among children. They mistook it for a toy. Millions of mines were scattered by helicopter gunships and infantry soldiers like a plague of locusts upon the land.Not long after the doctor's arrival, a villager showed up to the clinic carrying the flaccid body of his young daughter, who had picked up a butterfly mine. She was pure white, almost angelic, her soft skin broken by the intense red splashes of blood, her breathing shallow and agonal, her right hand blown off, her forearm a distorted jumble of flesh and bone as if dipped in red paint. There was urgency in the doctor's voice as the young girl was brought in. He stabilized her and transportation was arranged to the city hospital for emergent surgery.