Healer or money maker?



But tell me, your physician . . . is he a moneymaker, an earner of fees, or a healer of the sick?” - Socrates.

 

During a period of unemployment, I paid a visit to my dentists surgery. I couldn't get to see my regular dentist and acceded to seeing another dentist. At the end she rattled off lots of treatments I 'needed' then asked how I would like to pay.

 

Her assistant told the dentist I do not need to pay as I am currently unemployed, to which the dentist backtracked and said that in that case I should be ok for another 6 months, just come back next week for a cleaning.

 

For two weeks she was on the sick, by the third week I was told she had left the practice. Whether sacked for gross misconduct or left from shame/guilt I do not know.

 

The question Socrates asks of a physician is a valid one, whether doctor, dentist, optician, et al, are they a moneymaker, an earner of fees, or a healer of the sick?

 

The temptation for a professional healer to make more money from their patients is great. We have no way of knowing if we are being lied to or the truth is being bent in order that our healers can extract more money from our purse.

 

Even with an ethical code of practice, even if swearing the Hippocratic oath, how can we be sure these people do not succumb to temptation when taking money from us, or the state for that matter. How can two dentists in the same practice at the same level of qualification find one with many faults and another with none?

 

The healing profession demands a far higher level of virtue from us as people, something that should be considered before entering the profession, rather than seeing it as a cash-cow. Yet how many of us can truly say we put the pursuit of wisdom and virtue before material trifles and financial gains?