Focus on BooksInsights of
a patient-doctor links
Professor Sunanda MAHENDRA
When books are published, they cannot be just stored. Instead some
form of promotion is needed to create an awareness of the publication.
These promotion sessions are known as book launches or Pot Dorata Veduma,
we come across various types of book launches in our country. Some
prefer to launch a book in a bookshop or a publishing house.
Some others prefer to see a grand get together of well wishers in a
particular selected venue, where one or two speakers will either speak
on the value of the particular book launched, or select a broad topic
which has a reference to the book. Then there is the symposium type of
presentation, where the author prefers
to talk in his venture or an another subject relevant to the topic of
the day about a week or two ago a fine type of book launch came to be in
our little town in and around Jubilee Post in Nugegoda. The medical
doctor who is known to the people around this area, Dr. D. G. A.
Abeygunaratne, who is a general practitioner running his own medical
clinic called Green Tree, launched his little book titled as
Vaidyavarayaku Hamuveemata Pera Selakilimat Venna (Some points to ponder
over before meeting a medical doctor). The book running to 72 pages and
published by the doctor himself covers an pioneering subject which I
presume is introduced for the first time to the Sinhala reader.
Initially he should be introduced as a person who had been in the
medical profession at home and abroad over three decades.
He had been a doctor in England who had returned to his birthplace,
Sri Lanka, with the motive of helping the masses, as he stated that day.
As such he gets a pension from England, and he performs the present
function as a sensitive necessity. He has devoted time to write this
book to put certain practical points that should be adhered by the
patient as a good Samaritan of the country. In this direction he states
that family doctor or a general practitioner ought to be one of the most
qualified persons, who should be a registered doctor. He ought to
possess the right kind of approach for his profession as regards the
temperament of the patient. The patient who so comes to get treatment
may have to be directed by the GP concerned, prior to the patients
selections via various mushroom channels. In a country like England a
family is a person who is registered in the government sector, and
looked after by the state.
He gets a monthly salary. This is implemented as a result of the
National Health Service facilities available to the citizens. But in Sri
Lanka through the predicaments in government hospitals are free of
charge for the most part, a certain degree of ignorance on the part of
the patient prevails. Those who have money go straight to private
hospitals should obtain treatments. Those who are poor are compelled to
go to government hospital and perhaps due to the lack of facilities
quite a number of delays happen which presumably end up in tragedies.
But all in all one cannot just blame the government sector, as it
needs or anticipates certain upgrading. The writer doctor Abeygunaratne
also underlines certain guidelines by way of patient's attitude to his
her treatment attitude. Some times it so happens that the family doctor
turns to be a careful listening person who should be helped by the right
kind of ailment that the patient is suffering from. The failure to do so
many result in a negative tendency. As such a good patient should know
what exactly he/she should obtain as treatment from the doctor. One
would say that most of these factors have been perceived down the
centuries. But I feel that they have to be reiterated from time to time
to build up a better health communication culture, which in turn had
become a vital subject area in the teaching of development communication
and the university level education.
In addition to the basic guidelines laid down in the manner, our
writer goes one step ahead by jotting some widely known sicknesses named
as Diabetes, Asthma, Viral Fever, Cholesterol and high blood pressure
which a layman should know on each of those conditions are noted down in
simple terms in order to create an awareness of each ailments. In this
book the term hypertension is used for high blood pressure, wherever
need arises. The English medical term is used side by side with its
equivalent Sinhala medical term. This even enables to gather more
informative insights of the laid down sicknesses.
Turning once again to the occasion of the book launch held at Dr.
Abeygunaratne's medical clinic 'Green Tree', Dr Jayasundara Bandara, who
introduced the contents of the book state d that this is the right kind
of book that enhances in the formation of a 'Medical Media culture' (Vaidya
Madya Sanskrutiya). This item was a refined sort of gathering of an
alternative nature. A medical doctor not only treats our physical
ailments, me at times come to us to correct our oriental attitudes as
well. I record this happening as a pioneer approach as a n initial
socio-medical insight to the prevailing conditions.
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