Goodbye IPC

On most Wednesday afternoons, our class is divided into four groups of ten people for a course called Introduction to Patient Care. Each group has its own set of facilitators, all of whom are doctors who are part of the UP-PGH faculty and/or administration. Contrary to what the name of the course implies, we don't do anything involving actual patients or the application of medical principles. We haven't even begun real medical education after all. What actually takes place may be likened more to group therapy, with modules on self-actualization and such.

When I got my first taste of IPC on the first semester of last year, I didn't think I would get anything new from it. Coming from a Catholic school, I had been required to go through many similar self-empowerment themed activities. Some material was almost entirely the same as what we'd covered before.

Looking back, I was both right and wrong. It's true that I didn't learn any new psychological concepts, etc. However, in time, the weekly routine of sitting around with a group of people I was gradually getting to know better and just sharing my feelings or listening made a subtle but definite impression on me. I have come to realize this fully only now.

Today, we had our final session. I didn't know until one of my groupmates mentioned it to me. We had been going at it for three semesters already, and I assumed we would continue until the next. Apparently, we have something different in store for us later. I was surprised at how humdrum everything seemed. We had a regular session, our facilitators gave us some free food, which they do every now end then, we said our goodbyes, and then they left. And that was it.

I will probably miss the mandatory two hours I have to spend every Wednesday afternoon with my groupmates, though we will all still be around of course. I hope whatever replaces IPC next semester will retain the groupings, because I'd like to think all that sharing of feelings and thoughts has formed a special bond among us. I will miss our kind facilitators, whom we will probably encounter in our higher years. They didn't do anything exceptional, and I didn't expect them to. They were simply there to guide us and to listen. And that was enough.

One of our facilitators, Dr. Joy, recently left for a fellowship somewhere in Australia. I hope she's okay and settled in now. She was one of my favorites.