Musings by Jon

Some of us are old enough to remember when nursing was a vocation and nurses excelled at all the little things that add to patient comfort and make a hospital stay as bearable as possible. That’s why nursing is always up near the top of polls of the most trusted and admired professions. We worked long hours but always made time to reassure patients and truly care for them with compassion and skill.

All that has gone in many countries now. Nurses are now technicians and so busy there is no time to care. This is true in many Western countries I believe. The health system is stretched - patients wait, lawyers pounce and technology rules. High labour costs have ensured fewer nurses on the ground.

So, what about Thailand and what do patients say about Thai nurses? Here the labour costs are comparatively low. Nurses are well trained and add to that the cultural imperative of hospitality in this society and you have nurses who attend to, indeed anticipate, every need. And there seems to be so many of them! They always seem to have time and are not only a smiling presence but know what they are doing. Patients always say they have had a level of care far better than they would have received at home.

I interview many patients here for adult stem cell therapy and for PAD. Without exception they say that the hospital facilities and the medical and nursing staff far surpass what they would have expected to receive. True, many thought Thailand was a third world country BEFORE they came. That simply isn’t true. The private hospitals here are internationally accredited and offer state-of-the-art facilities, more like a five-star hotel than what we would consider normal for a hospital. People desperately ill who come to Bangkok for adult stem cell therapy for heart failure, PAD, congestive heart failure and cardiomyopathy go home as the best and most vocal of advocates for Thailand’s medical system.

I hope that Thai nurses stay just as they are. Attentive, skilled, compassionate, smiling and caring.