They say a hospital wall has heard more prayers than a temple.
And once you spend time there, you realise how true that is.
For most people, hospitals feel overwhelming.
For us medicos, they become our routine, moving between wards, ICUs, and OPDs.
But if you pause for a moment, it’s never just routine.
You feel it in brief eye contact, in the silence beside a patient’s bed, in the emotions people try to hide.
Everyone is carrying something unseen, and some stories are never told out loud.
And nowhere did this feel more evident to me than in the pediatric OPD.
At first, it feels simple, interacting with children, checking reflexes, assessing development. But sitting in a pediatric OPD changes that quickly.
It’s not just about treating a child.
It’s about understanding the fear in a parent’s voice, the questions they hesitate to ask.
And then there are the children, especially those who can’t speak yet.
They don’t tell you what’s wrong.
But their eyes do.
In those moments, everything becomes simple:
“How can I help this child?”
We take histories, examine, and write investigations.
But somewhere along the way, we also build trust.
Because treatment isn’t just medicine, it’s belief.
And when they leave a little more reassured, that feeling stays with you.
I still remember one child,
He couldn’t see.
He couldn’t hear.
My first thought was, how did no one notice this earlier?
But medicine humbles you.
Every situation has layers you don’t see.
That day, I learnt something important:
It’s easy to judge. It’s harder to understand.
He was referred for cataract surgery.
I met him again after the procedure.
The look in his parents’ eyes said everything: relief, gratitude, hope.
Moments like these shape us.
I may not be a doctor yet.
But I’m beginning to understand the kind of doctor I want to become.
Not just someone who treats disease,
but someone who understands people.
Because the most important lessons in medicine aren’t taught in lecture halls, they’re learnt quietly, in hospital corridors, between fear and hope.