NPR Dr. Alicia Conill "This I Believe"
>> Sunday, February 1, 2009
This morning, NPR played a reading from a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Alicia Conill, on the segment "This I Believe."
In Conill's essay, she recounts a story of treating a patient whose son lives down the block but who she hasn't seen for five years. Conill begins by talking about her story as if it is her own, but the woman said to sit down, that this was her story. She learns the power of listening.
Conill begins her essay with the statistic that a doctor interrupts a patient after 18 seconds. But often times, she says, the best medicine is listening.
Now, Conill has become the patient, as she was diagnosed some twenty years ago with MS. She now sits in a wheel chair as doctors interrupt her.
This reading is extremely powerful and really gets at the necessity to listen. Everyone has a story. Everyone needs someone to listen to their story.
Read the full "This I Believe" here.
