Buying time

Doctors buy time. Put aside the fact that doctors save life, we, in the medical line actually learn to buy time most of the time.

We give tocolytics to those pregnant mothers with premature contractions, hoping to buy at least 48 hours after the last steroid injection, before the baby rushes to see the world with very immature lungs.

We give regular blood transfusions for thallasemic patients to give them time. It is not a cure but this at least buy them time. It will be far too tragic to have your baby dead within the first year of life. That is why we buy as much time as we could, to prolong the time, to prolong life.

Victims of motor vehicle accident who came in with low GCS score, polytrauma, that you may not even know if he or she survives tomorrow, is resusitated, intubated and on mechanical ventilation. He or she may be dead few hours following the initial insult but we still do whatever we can, at our level best, to keep the victim alive as long as possible. Time bought may not be long but at least some of the loved ones may make it to the bedside before the last breath.

Patient came in with advanced breast carcinoma came in with metastasis to liver and bone. We still offer chemotherapy, hoping it will shrink the tumor enough and to proceed with toilet mastectomy. Not to offer cure, but this is what we called palliative. Perhaps giving more quality time to patients than they thought they initially would have helps them (not only patient, but also relatives and firends) to learn about the illness and to gradually learn that this is actually terminal. And perhaps, some would have less regrets with the borrowed time.

A cure is not something that can be offered always, but we try; we try to buy time, all the time. Life and mortality are in our phases all the time. Time is perhaps all we need, before we are ready.