My mother [Sushila Gawande] is in certain ways a positive deviant; someone who put her time and devotion to raising her children. She retired as a pediatrician a few years ago. She always managed to do it on only two half days a week; for the rest of the days she was at home.

The one way in which I saw her make a major difference in our little town in the Appalachian hills was how she treated patients. There are a lot of Caucasians and easily a third or more of the patients there had either no insurance or only Medicaid, which does not pay very well.

She always made it clear to patients that her doors were always open. In a sense my father's urology patients helped subsidise her pediatric patients; there were times she hardly broke even in her practice but she always had the door open for any mothers and children.

There were lots of teenage mothers. It's interesting she got to talk even more to the teenage mothers than she talked to the children. She tried to find out how they were raised and what opportunities were afforded them. And she talked to them about taking care of the babies. If that is not community building, what else is?

It was fascinating to see this woman in a sari and a thick Indian accent, talking to these Appalachian mothers, who had accents just as thick as hers, and the understanding they had between them.

To be continued. Image: A RediClinic in New York, which offers low-cost examination and treatments for minor illnesses.
Photograph: Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Also see: The inspiring story of Suresh Kamath

Back

|

Start