compassion...

I was paid a wonderful and disturbing compliment today by one of the head pharmacists in my department. He stated that he saw himself in me. In that, I have so much drive, so much compassion and epathy for others and put that above almost anything else that I do. Even on three hours of sleep you run like a well oiled machine and will be an incredible worker--that is a whole 'nother story.

In the next breath, he challenged that I would always be this way. That my desire to help patients and make sure they get what they need, would somehow waiver. As if it is some disallusion that I hold of the profession. Do I know that working in a practice that allows me to work with patients and use all of that knowledge they are feverishly cramming into my head will be hard to come by? And hard to build? And incredibly rewarding? And a fight every step of the way? Hell yea!

It is so distressing to me that a practicing pharmacist would challenge this of me. He doesn't know me very well. He does not know the certain death that will find me if I work for Walgreen's, or any such retail devil. Seriously, I have friends who have been told to kill me.
I have always been compassionate, pharmacy just gives me a way to practice. Do I think that I have a skewed view of things? No, I just know what can be done to people and try harder. Do third party payors suck? Hell, yea. But they make patients lives much easier if they work correctly, so take the time to call them. Direct them in the direction of patient assistance if they may need it. These are not difficult things.

Being a pharmacist was never about the money and never will be. I want to do this because making a patient smile and knowing that they recieved what they needed, makes my day, my week, my month. It makes me.