Decisions, Doubts and Dilemmas - pt 1

This blog post is inspired by a conversation with a friend, House season 6 episode 3 and this Note
-------------------------------------------------------------------

“I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.”

-Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken

And that has made all the difference, hasn’t it?

The choice to study my ass off for years and then to come out, still ignorant as hell. The choice to sacrifice hours of personal life or time with my family. The choice of countless sleepless nights and trading my sanity in for someone else’s.

The choice of studying medicine, of the pursuit to be a doctor.

The choice to a life of dilemmas.



My brother once presented me with a situation:

Adolf Hitler is being admitted to the hospital due to an unknown disease a few weeks after the attack on Austria and you’re the attending doctor then, in charge of saving his life. What is your call?

What can you do? What should you do?

Or, what WILL you do?


Do your work as a doctor, uphold your oath and save Hitler. After that, go back to your work everyday as if nothing happened. As if the niggling conscience at the back of your mind isn’t there, as if the guilt isn’t there, as if you haven’t leave the lives of thousands to be torn apart.

OR

Fake a misdiagnosis and murder him, breaking your oath and saving all those lives. But then live everyday knowing that you’ve intentionally killed someone, and let the guilt eat you up, the decision dragging you down from day to day, affecting your work performances and your life.

What is your call?



My answer then was to put him into a coma. Simple, right? The gray area, not killing him, but not letting him kill anyone else either for the matter.

But isn’t that just running away from the situation? Who am I to say that putting a person into a coma intentionally is not as bad as condemning the person to death? Or maybe it is worse, as you rob him of the dignity he might otherwise have gained by death?

Morals. Principles. The courage to carry out your decision. And a strong mind and heart to endure the self torture that are to come for years hence. The “what if’s”.


One, or millions?

A doctor, or a human being?



But who are you to decide what’s right and what’s wrong?