Today I am known all around for my skills with children
suffering with asthma...
The story had a personal beginning.
Ekalavya, my son, now 30, would come down with recurrent
episodes of cold and cough taking long to settle as an infant. I was then in my
mid-twenties, a young captain in the Army Medical Corps. I would often wonder
that why does he suffer as his sibling a year older did not get afflicted. It
was probably not an infective etiology then. Since the episodes were not very
severe and settled down easily, I stopped worrying.
Around the time he was 18 months old I was posted to Base
Hospital Barrackpore, in the outskirts of Kolkata. I was a single parent, my
husband was pursuing higher studies overseas. There were floods in Bengal and
an officer had to be sent on special duties to help the locals and the troops.
As I spoke Bengali, I was given the orders to go. Not one to shirk duties, I
accepted the orders but made a request to be allowed to take my children and
their nanny with me. I was given the permission to do so.
The duty was gratifying but the surroundings damp and
mouldy. One night I heard loud wheezing in the room at night .There were my two
children and me in the room. I knew the sound came from one of them .Little
Ekalavya was breathing heavily and distressed. With a torchlight, I skipped
over puddles of water to bring him some medicines. I knew none of this would
work in a hurry .Those days asthma care was primitive. I had to give him a shot
of adrenaline. He settled.In a few days time we returned back to the base as my
duties were over. I knew then that Ekalavya had asthma, he had strong genetic
propensity from both sides of families.
In a few month’s time I completed my commission with the
Indian Army. We joined my husband at UK. I chose to work as an observer in the
Respiratory Unit of a tertiary care Paediatric Hospital. I got home what was
the best available treatment for Ekalavya and he did very well.
On return to India we discontinued treatment. But one Diwali
when the house was buzzing with friends who had dropped by to wish us, I saw
Ekalavya was not in the room. He had been coughing the past few days. I found
him lying in bed breathless, answering me in monosyllables. My husband ,not
from the same profession did not understand the gravity of situation. But one
of my childhood friends was there. We got onto his scooter, me clutching onto a
breathless child, who was beginning to grunt. We raced to the hospital
Emergency Room, it helped that I was the senior Paediatric resident. Ekalavya
settled. But many don't...
Thus started my crusade for the asthmatic child.
I make their lungs the heart of my practice.
editors note: Thank you Dr Barnali Bhattacharya for your heart felt message. it is said that to be a good doctor we must empathise. but beyond Empathy is 'kinship'. where empathy says ; i know how you feel...kinship says; i have felt what you are feeling.
This kinship with your patients parents , makes you a better doctor, and thus a renowned name in Asthma counselling and treatment.
