The Question I Should Have Asked Raj Sooner
How a patient's medications were not the problem -- and what changed when we finally named the right one. 💊 😴 🫁 😷 🏥 The first time Raj sat down in my clinic, he placed a small paper bag of medications between us and asked if there was anything else we could add. Nothing seemed to be working anymore. He was fifty-two. He was on three medications for his blood pressure and two for his diabetes. His morning readings were still in the high 150s over 90s. His three-month A1C had crept up again, despite the walking, the smaller meals, and cutting sugar from his tea. He described fatigue that he could no longer explain. “I am doing everything I am supposed to,” he said. “I do not know what is left to try.” His wife sat beside him, hands folded in her lap, with the expression I have come to recognize in spouses of patients with chronic illness: half concern, half exhaustion, and a quiet reserve of observations she had not been asked to share. So I asked her.“How does Raj sl...