It’s Not Greek to Me! Lessons in Compassion

In Greek, the phrase “to be moved with compassion” is splangchnizomai. This verb stems from

the Greek word splanchna, which means guts or entrails. Thus, for the Greeks, compassion

linguistically meant “to be moved deep within the guts.” The Greeks weren’t talking about

indigestion, but rather acknowledging another’s plight and feeling it with them. Compassion

arises from the human condition we share with every other person. It means seeing our

similarities rather than our differences. True compassion motivates action.

In medicine, compassion must color the way physicians and healthcare professionals treat their

patients. With so many things pressing on their minds and so many commitments and duties

pulling them in different directions, I can see how it might be easy for a healthcare professional

to lose sight of the actual living, breathing individuals for whom they are caring. I learned how

compassion plays a role in patient care when I volunteered at the Center for Hospice Care in

South Bend this past semester.

One rainy Thursday morning, when I was asked to assist with a bed bath for the patient in room

5, I did not think much of it. I had given bed baths before so I washed my hands, donned some

gloves and strolled into the room. The nurse was already in the room. I watched as she lightly

touched the patient’s shoulder and explained that we were going to be moving him a little bit.

He did not respond. As we began to turn him, he suddenly cried out in pain and grasped at my

hand. My heart started beating faster; we were unintentionally hurting him. We stopped

moving him. His eyes locked on mine and he spoke. But I could not understand him. He did

not speak English. I touched his shoulder and spoke gently but my words did not comfort him

because he could not understand. The nurse too spoke gently and touched him softly. He

calmed a bit, but the movement still pained him. His brown eyes were the same color as mine,

and our skin tones were also similarly dark. As we finished the bed bath as quickly as possible, I

found myself wondering if he had a daughter who looked like me, or perhaps a granddaughter.

Did he have a wife, maybe a grown son or grandchildren? Where was he from? How did he

come to Indiana? What had he done in life before arriving at the Center for Hospice Care? I

wondered what his eyes had seen, what his hands had done. Before me was not “Room 5

patient,” but a real man who was alive, had lived many years, seen many more things than I

had. We both lived on the same good Earth and our paths crossed that morning for some

reason.

This, I think, is where compassion comes into medicine. The man in room 5 that Thursday

morning has stuck with me. I hope to go to medical school soon and to one day be a physician.

I intend to keep the man from room 5 in my heart because he taught me a simple lesson in

compassion. He taught me that patients are closer to us than we may realize sometimes. I

have always known this, but I experienced it more fully on that rainy Thursday morning. We

must never forget the individual people we treat; we must never overlook that movement in

our hearts for the plight of another. We must never forget our similarities.

Brie Bahe is from Farmington, New Mexico, which has lots of desert dirt, sunlight, and blue skies.  She is a senior majoring in Neuroscience & Behavior with a minor in Philosophy.  She enjoys all things cozy, such as coffee, tea, wool socks, coffee, gingerbread, and coffee. She plans to attend medical school after graduation.