By visiting patients in their home, by helping them come to terms with their illness, I could heal when I could not cure.
ABRAHAM VERGHESEI think we can see how blessed we are in America to have access to the kind of health care we do if we are insured, and even if uninsured, how there is a safety net.
More Abraham Verghese Quotes
-
-
The Country Doctor Revisited captures the trials and tribulations of medicine, but also the satisfaction and the extraordinary rewards that come to those who embrace such a practice.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
Your job is to preserve yourself, not to descend into their hole. It’s a relief when you arrive at this place, the point of absurdity, because then you are free, you owe them nothing.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
The rituals we use for marriage, baptism or inaugurating a president are as elaborate as they are because we associate the ritual with a major life passage, the crossing of a critical threshold, or in other words, with transformation.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
Pray tell us, what’s your favorite number?”… “Shiva jumped up to the board, uninvited, and wrote 10,213,223″… “
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
We come unbidden into this life, and if we are lucky we find a purpose beyond starvation, misery, and early death which, lest we forget, is the common lot.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
When we cannot cure or save a life, our patients can at least feel cared for. It should be a basic human right.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
A beautiful literary collection that tells of today’s country doctor, somewhat removed from our romantic black-bag image of days gone by, but still fulfilling an essential need in caring for spread-out populations.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
We are all fixing what is broken. It is the task of a lifetime. We’ll leave much unfinished for the next generation.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
I had an uncle who, looking back, was probably not the most-educated physician around but he carried it off so well.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
Empathy can be replaced by cynicism.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
I always wondered if the good people who send us bibles really think that hookworm and hunger are healed by scripture? Our patients are illiterate.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
Though I am fascinated by knowledge, I am even more fascinated by wisdom.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
Literature is a beautiful way of keeping the imagination alive, of visiting worlds you would never have time to in your day-to-day life. It keeps you abreast of a wider spectrum of human activities.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
Yesterday misspent can’t be recall’d Vanity makes beauty contemptible Wisdom is more valuable than riches.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE -
They realize the no money, no church service, no eulogy, no funeral procession no matter how elaborate, can remove the legacy of a mean spirit.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE






