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Pulse Readers’ Hopes and Wishes for the New Year

Pulse Readers

Editor’s Note: Ten days ago, we invited Pulse readers to share with us their hopes and wishes for the new year. Here are some of their responses.


For my young patients who are living with HIV, I hope for relief from the stigma that shadows their lives, their health and their futures, and for acceptance and respect from family, friends, schools and society. For youth growing up surrounded by violence and poverty and by systems of education, health and human services that often fail them, I wish for empowering systems, safe spaces and nurturing adults who will help them to dream and to realize their potential.

Cathy Samples
(Director, Boston HAPPENS Program
at Children’s Hospital Boston)
Boston, MA

——————–

After watching my daughters experience three miscarriages, my wish (and prayer) for the new year is a healthy grandchild. My oldest daughter is now six weeks pregnant, and her first ultrasound is next week. We’re praying this little one arrives in August, healthy and whole. What greater gift and wish is there than new life?

Elizabeth Szewczyk
Enfield, CT

——————–

I wish that today’s medical students would become the healthcare reformers of tomorrow, taking the lead in controlling medical costs by practicing medicine that is science- and evidence-based and that includes best practices of prevention and health promotion. I wish that more medical school graduates would help to improve the health of the poor in their communities, in our nation and in nations beyond our borders. I wish that the students in my medical school would become tomorrow’s physician advocates for social justice. I hope to maintain the energy and commitment needed to help today’s medical students realize these possibilities.

Albert S. Kuperman
(Senior Advisor, Office of the Dean
Albert Einstein College of Medicine)
Bronx, NY

——————–

Haiku

Napa sparkling wine
truffled popcorn with butter–
first walk of the year

Neal Whitman
Pacific Grove, CA

——————–

I wish for healthy happiness in my life, for my family and friends, for my patients, for our community and for all the world. Peace and joy built on a foundation of health for all!

Kohar Jones
Chicago, IL

——————–

Nkosi Sikeleli Africa (God Bless Africa). These Xhosa words, an old hymn adopted as the national anthem of South Africa, are now more meaningful than ever. Bring an end to hatred, violence, intolerance, war, genocide, starvation and the scourge of AIDS and all else that may ravage this beautiful continent and its remarkable people. May the world see the beauty in this land and in the hearts and souls of her people and be emboldened by an overwhelming desire to save her. We are a part of Africa, and Africa is a part of us.

Patricia Lenahan
(Director, Comprehensive CARE Center
Share Our Selves–SOS)
Costa Mesa, CA

——————–

Peace on earth
Good will toward men
Affordable healthcare for all

Jeri Burn
South Lyon, MI

——————–

I dream and hope for change beyond healthcare reform. Let there be healing with touch, talk and, yes, of course, medicine.

Katherine Ellington
Saint Albans, NY

——————–

* I wish our EMR (electronic medical record) weren’t so awful!!!
* And that someone would discover a cure for traffic…and inconsiderateness…crowds…and stupidity.
* (I wish that I could learn to frame my realities less negatively.)
* I wish that I were smarter, fitter, faster, wittier…or that others were less discriminating about these matters…or believed that the way I am represents the ideal.
* I wish that when I wished for the end of ALL world suffering, it didn’t sound like such a cliche…or seem like over-compensating for being self-absorbed.
* I wish that I had ignored the invitation to wish in the first place…or at least had done a better job with the opportunity.

Sean C. Lucan
Bronx, NY

——————–

Haiku

That all whose cup runs
over see it, fill those whose
cups are underfilled.

Robert S. Fawcett
(Associate Director
York Hospital Family Medicine Residency)
York, PA

——————–

May this year bring each of us the blessing of honoring our feelings and experiences, accepting ourselves in all our complexity, integrating our wounds with our gifts and deeply enjoying the moments of our lives.

Ronit Fallek
New York, NY

——————–

I wish that key stakeholders, numerous and diverse as they are, would work collaboratively towards resolving the formidable health-related issues that we face in this nation. I wish that the healthcare provided to individuals would encompass sensitivity and compassion and extend to families, caregivers and their communities. I wish that healthcare practitioners would renew their commitment and find a genuine sense of meaning and fulfillment in their critically important work.

Diane M. Kondratowicz
(Coordinator, Patient-centered Medicine Scholars Program
University of Illinois College of Medicine at Chicago)
Chicago, IL

——————–

I wish that more and more people will reach out to those in need and realize that giving is what brings us happiness.

Xinshu She
(Albert Einstein College of Medicine
Johns Hopkins School of Public Health)
Baltimore, MD

——————–

A Haiku Dream for 2010

Golden, smiling suns
Days of wonder, good health, love
Star-filled nights of peace

Ronna Edelstein
Pittsburgh, PA

——————–

It is most certainly a time in history for an era of compassion, integrity and safety. Let’s begin with medicine and blaze the trail in 2010. The others will follow when they see our success.

Dale Ann Micalizzi
(Executive Director, Justin’s HOPE Project
The Task Force for Global Health)
Schenectady, NY

——————–

I wish that everyone who wants to conceive will be successful at bringing new life into this world and that no one will need to know the pain of infertility.

Paula M. Zimlicki
Menlo Park, CA

——————–

Here’s wishing everyone affordable health coverage, a warm house to live in and good, healthy food to eat.

Brenda Caronia
Bronx, NY

——————–

For my first-year medical students, I wish that their interest in patients as persons continues into next year. For my second-year students, I hope that when they enter their clerkships in the summer they will remember what they learned about humanism and will still think of Mrs. Mary Jones as a patient in room 210 and not as “the gallbladder in 210.”

Maurice Bernstein
(Keck School of Medicine
University of Southern California)
Los Angeles, CA

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