er vs or

ER has always been a very dynamic environment, to put it nicely. one minute you're idly sitting on your chair, then by the next minute you find yourself sweating more than a hundred chest pumps in one minute or else the patient expires.

by contrast, the OR finds its rhythm in the planned unknown. many times, the surgery plan is drawn days or even weeks ahead. even for emergency cases, materials are prepped neatly before the patient gets inside the operating theatre. still, no one knows for sure which outcome will it be.

at the OR, the patient is stripped naked, with only a piece of cloth or two covering the essentials. whether you are under charity or pay, everyone has to be stripped down to their birthday suit up to the post-anesthesia care unit. while there are a few stereotypical telltale signs of income levels, such as skin blemishes or nail hygiene, there's actually little use for us to know whether you have a million pesos in your bank account or you live way below poverty line. we just need you to live through the surgery, and we will do our best to give you that fighting chance.

" ...there's actually little use for us to know whether you have a million pesos in your bank account or you live way below poverty line"

at the ER, especially when in a public hospital, it is easy to discern differences in wealth such as by the kind of garments they wear and by the vehicle they alighted from. although in utopia all patients should be treated nicely regardless of status, in reality pay patients get a much nicer approach from hospital people.

i find all of this unsurprising, though. money certainly begets power, but not necessarily respect. in the end, based on christian texts at least, our lives are judged not by how much we have accrued but in how much we have given. blessed are the people at ER and OR who have willingly dedicated their lives to serve the filipino people.


this post is dedicated to my recent rotations at the departments of anesthesiology and emergency medicine.