Hippo…….
Hippo……is that hippo- like hippopotamus. Sounds like it should be a prefix for “big”.
That orange one in the photograph- was the biggest jack we had on site. It was helping hold up a 24×48 barn and doing the job of supporting it while there was examination and treatment to restore the structure.
Or maybe “big deal”?
Next thing that comes to mind is hippocratic ?
-
of or relating to hippocrates or to the school of medicine that took his name
Hippocrates
\hip-ˈäk-rə-ˌtēz\play(circa 460 BC–circa 370 BC), Greek physician. Hippocrates has been traditionally regarded as the founder of medicine. A teacher at an early Greek medical school, he strove to make an art and a science out of medicine and remove it from the realm of magic and superstition. Of the large body of works attributed to him, he probably wrote only a fraction. The corpus of Hippocratic writings covered such topics as diet, exercise, regimen, sleep, and external remedies. Hippocratic medicine divided diseases into acute and chronic, epidemic and endemic, malignant and benign. A basic belief of that school was that the four humors of the body (blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile) were the seats of disease. The Hippocratic oath owes much to the teachings and practice of Hippocrates although he probably did not personally write it- thought to be written by a student or contemporary of his a century later.
HIPPOCRATIC OATH: CLASSICAL VERSION
I swear by Apollo Physician and Asclepius and Hygieia and Panaceia and all the gods and goddesses, making them my witnesses, that I will fulfill according to my ability and judgment this oath and this covenant:
To hold him who has taught me this art as equal to my parents and to live my life in partnership with him, and if he is in need of money to give him a share of mine, and to regard his offspring as equal to my brothers in male lineage and to teach them this art—if they desire to learn it—without fee and covenant; to give a share of precepts and oral instruction and all the other learning to my sons and to the sons of him who has instructed me and to pupils who have signed the covenant and have taken an oath according to the medical law, but no one else.
I will apply dietetic measures for the benefit of the sick according to my ability and judgment; I will keep them from harm and injustice.
I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody who asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. Similarly I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy. In purity and holiness I will guard my life and my art.
I will not use the knife, not even on sufferers from stone, but will withdraw in favor of such men as are engaged in this work.
Whatever houses I may visit, I will come for the benefit of the sick, remaining free of all intentional injustice, of all mischief and in particular of sexual relations with both female and male persons, be they free or slaves.
What I may see or hear in the course of the treatment or even outside of the treatment in regard to the life of men, which on no account one must spread abroad, I will keep to myself, holding such things shameful to be spoken about.
If I fulfill this oath and do not violate it, may it be granted to me to enjoy life and art, being honored with fame among all men for all time to come; if I transgress it and swear falsely, may the opposite of all this be my lot.
—Translation from the Greek by Ludwig Edelstein. From The Hippocratic Oath: Text, Translation, and Interpretation, by Ludwig Edelstein. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1943.
The modern version accepted and recited by most medical schools today strays far from the original.
Are there two or one traditional + one new one?
Or has it strayed so far from the original intent that is is now hippocritical?
behaving in a way that suggests one has higher standards or more noble beliefs than is the case.
Why is it that we have to protect ourselves and patients from medical harm- first with the 100,000 lives campaign, then the 5 million lives campaign and now the 500 million lives campaign? Do you know what they all have in common? First do no harm- the original hippocratic oath. Perhaps, we should drift back to our original intent.
The external pressures on health care providers are winning- the best practice list, the un-common sense approach to diagnosis- following what insurance will pay for instead of what the practitioner believes is needed, following the un-common sense to the treatment discussion- treating medically futile conditions that cause more pain and suffering than benefit without full disclosure on “what this will look like to the patient and family”. Taking the easier and safer path for ourselves and our agency vs what is our first priority- first do no harm.
My last 6 weeks of experience have brought this to light- like shining a bright spotlight- on the delayed listening- delayed investigation- wrong treatment- additional damage- more dangerous and frightening testing and now- the first diagnosis should have been identified 5 weeks ago- and I could have supported my body in healing itself instead of getting back to baseline after “harm” through 6 doctors and contacts with medical care- the care everyone feels is their right.
Let’s go back to when it was more important to do what was right, than make everyone feel they are doing the right thing by following a protocol “right in they eyes of lawyers, for most people and covered by insurance carriers”.
This is the second line in the modern day version:
I will apply, for the benefit of the sick, all measures [that] are required, avoiding those twin traps of over-treatment and therapeutic nihilism.
Bet you didn’t know what nihilism was? Defined as :the rejection of all religious and moral principles, often in the belief that life is meaningless. A twin trap identified in 1964 when they revised the oath. Interesting, huh?
| Figure out what the big things really are! Hippocratic or hippocritic? |
Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.