Attending Others

Book Title: Attending Others

Book Author: Brian Volck

Publication Information: Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2016, 206 pp., $25, paperback

When the scholarship to pay for graduate studies in English literature did not come through, Brian Volck went with his “Plan B”: medical school. He became a truly gifted primary care physician (pediatrician), but we can all be grateful that he didn’t stop writing. He is in the elite company of others—such as the late Richard Selzer, surgeon and author—who heal both body and soul via skillful contributions to both medicine and literature.

In Attending Others, Dr Volck shares his personal odyssey, revealing in it lessons critical for those who seek proficiency in the healing arts. “Stories weave the fabric of my lessons in doctoring” (page 11). Early in the book he credits mentors who taught him the meaning of being an attending physician: they listened, spoke with care, and never stopped learning. These three characteristics are explored, like a symphonic theme and variations, throughout personal stories recounted in the book.

For example, when speaking of the importance of attentive listening, Volck defines writing as “a practice of focused attention and response…” (p 9). While specifically referring to the exercise of his art, one cannot avoid drawing a parallel to the writing all physicians do. Good physicians listen, yet how many of us view our medical documentation (writing!) as focused attention and response to our patients, rather than mere administrative drudgery? Perhaps we should.

Through the very personal episodes he shares, Dr Volck stresses the importance of speaking with care. The reader experiences with him a sinking heart when a childhood friendship is damaged by a racial comment spoken in jest, or when inadvertent offense is given in a professional setting. The author’s soul is bared as he shares his gaffes, and the reader benefits from the lessons learned. Countless poignant examples of both the healing and hurting power of words illustrate the importance of speaking with care.

Continuing education ought to be a hallmark of all physicians. However, restricting oneself to textbooks and journals is short-sighted. “I learned as much from patient encounters and stories told in exam rooms” as from textbooks and journal articles, the author states. He then drives the point home by stressing “almost all the books that schooled me in the fraught world of doctor-patient encounters came from outside the peer-reviewed medical canon: short stories… novels… memoirs…” (p 123). While appropriately valuing biomedical education, Dr Volck reminds readers how critical it is for the physician to be well-read in nonmedical literature in order to be proficient in human interactions. How often this is forgotten!

Near to the heart of family physicians is the author’s explicit appreciation of the importance of generalists, especially those in primary care practice. Though at the time of writing this book he had transitioned to a hospitalist practice, he is not among those who might disparage the “local MD.” Rather, he draws on his experiences in primary care to continue to “practice the presence in touching my patients, in hearing their stories, in sharing their grief and fear” (p 187).

As the reader approaches the end of this journey, they discover the crux of it all: love. Not the emotion, idolized by our western culture, but the action; the love of which the Greeks spoke using the word αγαπε (agape). While others have applied this lesson to leadership in other settings,¹ the deep, selfless, soul-felt concern for others is the very foundation of good medical care—an important reminder in our increasingly technophilic profession.

Attending Others is a personal account of the author’s professional development as a physician, and is relevant to other health care professionals and even the general public. Readers will gain insight into themselves, as Dr Volck’s experiences trigger personal recollection and reflections. Reading this volume has the potential to make one a better person.

To paraphrase Richard Selzer: Why do physicians write? The desire to be a healer.² Dr Volck demonstrates again the sacred role in healing that is held by the physician-writer.

Finally, and worth noting, Dr Volck ultimately realized his “Plan A” of graduate training in literature: earning an MFA in writing nearly a quarter of a century after receiving his MD.