Career in medicine: Inspiring stories from real world doctors

How many of you are doubting whether you are really smart enough for medical school? In today’s technologically advanced society you don't have to be smart enough to study in a medical school, you just have to work very hard. If a career in medicine is something you really wanna pursue then you really need to learn how to be efficient in studying. A medical school is really challenging in itself and the road to become a doctor is indeed a long one. But success does not happen accidently. One really needs to work hard to achieve whatever they want in life. For a few people it's extremely easy to read. Why? Because they are aware of all 26 letters of the alphabet. What if they knew only 17 or 18 letters? What could they read? Not everything and in some cases nothing at all. Well, a career in medicine works exactly the same way if you’re missing particulars it will all become very unclear. There’s a tale and a mission behind every medical applicant who turns into a student and later a doctor for the masses. Today, on the occasion of National Doctors day we present you inspiring stories from Dr Manan Vora, Dr. Kunal Sarkar, Dr. Santanu Sen, Dr. Vanshika Gupta Adukia and Dr. Alexander Kuruvilla.

“Since I have a familial medical background (both my grandfathers, parents, and their siblings are all doctors), I grew up in a very different environment compared to other kids. I’m not kidding when I say my dinner table conversation during meal time was about various patient cases seen during the day, and fun discussions between a doctor in my family and their patient/relative. I don’t know how much medicine I understood from back then but I surely picked up some doctor-patient communication skills from my family dinner chat sessions. As expected, by everyone around me, I went on to pursue my career in Medicine and later on, Orthopaedic Surgery. To say the journey has been a bed of roses, would just be wrong, because it’s been a real roller coaster ride. Like every profession, this one too comes with its pros and cons. While spending your late teens and early twenties at college and with books while you see your friends enjoy, graduate, and start earning money is disheartening, I cannot deny that the feeling you get when you actually become a doctor is just magical. I wouldn’t trade my journey, and my career as a doctor for any other”. - Dr Manan Vora, Sports Medicine Expert & Orthopaedic Surgeon, Juhu, Mumbai.

“The roadway to become a doctor is a beautiful journey but for the challenges built in it we need to have not just intelligence but also the attitude to stick in this profession and if you do at the end of it all you’ll enjoy. As a doctor I have faced numerous challenges in my professional field just like sports you never win every match you play so I had to realise that when the going is not good and when I approach the the relatives and the people whose loved ones are not going to have the end result or the outcome they would want to, the kind of sympathy and understanding I get from them is probably one of the biggest human experiences that gives me the faith and energy to move on. Being brought up in an industrial family I had no great idea about medicine, hearing about industrial problems the entire day triggered me to take up something different as a career . Furthermore, I used to hear from my grandmother that my grandfather used to be a very popular doctor and physician those days so that was a little bit of a fairytale to me. My grandmother used to tell me all his stories so I probably got into medicine getting transported from the world of stories that she used to tell me. It wasn't a very methodological decision but today after spending decades in this profession I can say that most of my grandma's fairytale stories were true”. - Dr. Kunal Sarkar, Senior Vice Chairman, Director and Head of Cardiac Surgery at Medica Superspecialty Hospital.

“Being a paediatrician has been one of the most enjoyable, satisfying, and fulfilling life decisions for me! I look forward to going to work each day, which is filled with playful banter with the kids, and knowing that I am making a difference in their lives. But, during my early years of training, I realised that patients with paediatric cancer and blood diseases were not receiving the treatment they needed due to a lack of experts. This became my driving force to train as paediatric cancer and transplant specialist. Today I am grateful that I have been able to make a difference in so many lives, saving children with a transplant and curing them of their cancers! I hope to continue with my work in the future, guiding parents and children to live a long and disease-free life.” -Dr. Santanu Sen, Consultant, Paediatrics, Paediatric Haematology, Oncology & Stem Cell Transplantation, Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital.

“My toughest day at the medical school has to be my first ever mortifying experience in the anatomy lab- I cried to my father, I couldn’t get over the sight of the bodies in the lab. But I probably felt at my weakest during a phase in the third year. It is ‘the’ year that truly tests you mentally and physically preparing you for the high stress moments in this field. In less than 365 days we study roughly 59 subjects and give perhaps triple the number of exams. During that phase, I often used to weep and vent to my father, convinced I wanted to quit.While on most days he tried to comfort me, one day there’s something he said that I will never forget- ‘You know that title of Dr, it is linked to saving lives and so you have to earn it but once it’s attached as a prefix to your name, it is yours to keep for eternity.’ Post graduating, instead of opting for my masters in physiotherapy I chose to amalgamate my profession to my passion and love for babies. My transition to specialise as a pregnancy & childbirth specialist was often questioned considering the lack of awareness in the field. Many said it was ‘fad’, they were convinced that I would fail miserably and then go back to being a physiotherapist. Today I head Therhappy- working with to be mums, new parents, infants and toddlers. Along the way, building awareness in this field through a social media platform that is growing little by little gradually with time”. - ​​ Dr. Vanshika Gupta Adukia, Pregnancy Childbirth and Lactation Specialist, Pelvic Floor Physiotherapist and Founder of Therhappy, Worli, Mumbai.

“While the Pandemic affected each one of us, I personally understand the effect that it had on doctors in particular. Each doctor prioritised their patient’s well-being over everything else during this time. They not just invested more time, but they adapted to the changing needs by meeting people where they were—at home and online, all this without compromising on the quality of care provided.” - Dr. Alexander Kuruvilla, Chief Healthcare Strategy Officer, Practo, Bengaluru.

Above and beyond everything else while we all focus to fulfil different goals in our lives, it is always the journey that counts in the end. Becoming a doctor might be a goal for millions but the encounters and feelings that you would go through throughout the course of your medical education is what will structure your career in medicine for the good.