A patient came in today complaining of swelling of her abdomen. I have seen 100s of patients with liver cancer here and expected it to be the same thing. When I took her to ultrasound, I was greeted by something I had never seen before. Not only did the swelling look much different than other liver masses I had seen, it also seemed to be smiling at me. I don't know why the mass was smiling, but it made me smile seeing it smile. Hopefully the smile is a good thing, maybe it is telling us it isn't cancer and this women has a good chance to make it, or maybe it is saying that even when things are bad, we can still smile.
I see a lot of bad things each day; cancer, abortions, AIDS, TB, infections so bad people won't walk again, car accidents injuries, head injuries from falls, depression, domestic violence and death, lots of death. Hoping I can remember to smile through it all and help the patients smile too despite their pain and hurting.
