A Physician Must Have a Heart to Save Lives to Become a Great Healer
When my mother was tormented by illness, I sought doctors everywhere, not hesitating to lose my fortune or abandon my career. In the process of taking her from doctor to doctor, I encountered countless sorrowful things. In the end my mother could not be saved, and I could only slightly ease some of the torments she endured in life. Her illness made me realize that this world needs great physicians—cangsheng dayi—with a heart to rescue the living. Humankind suffers because of illness, and the physician is its only savior, the last line of defense for life and health. So I set out on the road of studying and practicing medicine, to save patients like my mother.
The Medicine King Sun Simiao wrote of the spirit of great medical sincerity (da yi jing cheng): “Jing” is excellence of medical skill; “cheng” is the sincerity of treating patients as one's own kin. Sun Simiao was often ill in childhood, and his family sought doctors everywhere for his sake until they were ruined, yet still his health problem was not solved. So he himself resolved to study medicine, saving the dying and healing the wounded, hanging up his gourd to serve the world; after death he was revered as the Medicine King. Both his medical skill and his medical virtue command the utmost admiration. It is precisely such a physician who can earn patients' true trust and love.
Some physicians and medical institutions today are motivated only by profit, treating patients as lambs to be slaughtered and pursuing nothing but economic gain—so that patients die not of disease but of poverty. Alas! When suffering patients like my mother writhe in this world, how can they not feel anguish? Every good physician removed from the world means countless more patients suffering in hell.
A physician should ceaselessly strive for excellence in skill, yet in treating patients should always be honest and sincere, telling them truthfully what he can and cannot help with, and treating patients and their families with warmth and good faith. As long as one does this, how could patients ever hate physicians? Although I am not clever, I have treated people with this one word—sincerity—and to this day the great majority of patients treat me like family; my reputation has spread without my lifting a finger, so why should I spend a cent on advertising?
The essence of the medical profession is to relieve patients' physical and mental suffering. If one studies medicine merely to secure a livelihood, one inevitably departs from medicine's original purpose. If one carries out medical work with a genuine wish to solve patients' problems, the way will surely be smooth. But if from the very start one departs from this purpose and aims only at getting rich, the road will not go far.
The way of medicine is the way of benevolence. Medical skill is a benevolent art. Benevolence is the goodness driven by a heartfelt feeling of compassion; only such goodness, in harmony with the way of heaven, can win the hearts of the people, reach the highest realm, and produce a great physician.