This is a complex question. By what criteria could, or should, a physician be measured? We could consider such standards as years of experience, board certification(s), institutional affiliations, academic appointments, research grants & publications, and newly added, patient satisfaction surveys. Yet, none of these measure one of the most important qualities we expect of physicians: personal concern and care.
Measure by these qualities, I’m privileged to introduce two of the very best doctors, Jackey Tong and Pangyan. Oh, they have acquired some of the aforementioned standards of excellence. But moreover, both men have invested years of their professional lives providing medical care for some of China’s most difficult to reach patients – elderly, HIV-positive, low-income, disabled, and orphaned – while receiving in return little in the way of worldly rewards.
There’s truth to the phrase People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. In China, as in the United States, personal concern and care are enduring virtues of the very best doctors.