Tai-Zhong Clinic and Health Screening

I spent a long day Wednesday at a Family Medicine Clinic in Tai-Zhong and had a really great day, learning a lot. The doctor there is about my father's age and quite knowledgable and kind. He saw a whole range of patients: from children and factory workers to lawyers, a German scuba diver and a prostitute. Dr. L is also an expert in acupuncture and has studied it for more than 20 years. In Taiwan, doctors have the option of studying either Western medicine (Xi Yao) or Chinese medicine (Zhong Yao) or both. He noted that if you take only the Western medicine route, most doctors do not also study acupuncture as he did.

He had some interesting things to say about specialties and choosing what you want to do. We discussed why he had chosen Family medicine over some other specialty and he told me it was because he was interested in many things and wanted to have broad knowledge, rather than focusing a lot on one area/organ system. I said that in America, I have heard some people that think primary care doctors are "Jack[s] of all trades but Master[s] of none" and I asked him what he thought about that with regard to Taiwan. I liked his answer, however simple and logical it was: he said, every doctor has areas in which he/she excels and areas in which he/she is weak. A specialist may have very deep knowledge of one area, but is more or less at the expense of some other area of medicine and we need folks to cover all bases. A primary care doctor should be particularly skilled at integrating the different organ systems, the history, the personality/lifestyle of the patient and the different medications he or she has recieved. He said the tragedy in medicine as a profession is when a doctor does not know what his or her skills and limitations are; you must know your own capabilities and work within them to be effective both as a primary care and a a subspecialty doctor.

Yesterday, I went with a busful of hospital staff to a factory here that makes Nike and New Balance shoes. We did health screenings for 80 factory workers in 3 hours. Whew! Every 3 years, a group of nurses, technicians and doctors go to a factory and do a basic health screening for all their workers. This includes weight, visual acuity, blood pressure, chest X-Rays, blood and urine workups, hearing tests, and a short physical exam. It was very efficient and even with set-up, clean-up and driving, we were back to the hosptial in 4 hours.

For lunch, there was a drug rep who talked to us about statins and cholesterol levels, much like in the US. Fortunately, the powerpoint had a lot of English on it with graphs. Otherwise, I think his fast talking and medical jargon would have left me lost.

It's really gratifying to see that I actually did learn something this past year in medical school; quite a lot, really, when you consider where I started from! :)

After getting off, a friend and I went to eat Taiwanese "ice" (not cream), which is basically shaved ice topped with red bean, flavored rice and sweet tofu. It's very refreshing and delicious. Later, she and I went to a big night market and walked around looking at people and thing to buy and eating snacks (Taiwanse love small snack and drink stands). I tried stinky tofu and I have to say, I think it tastes about as good as it smells! (You were right, RV!)

Now I've got some homework to do. :)