As a medical student, I participated in a group session to demonstrate the impact of illness on families. One patient was asked to stand, given a piece of coloured thread and asked to choose a "spouse" from the group. The chosen spouse stood too, and took the string, creating a bond. This couple pretended to have children: new string colours were chosen. The children grew up and formed their own relationships until everyone was standing with connecting strings. The room became a blend of colours, the tangled network no longer decipherable.
"Imagine someone gets sick," said the facilitator, "what will happen to all the string?"
One person sat. We couldn't maintain our hold, and the web plunged downward, pulling us all toward the floor.
My sister's untimely death in 2017 reinforced this powerful lesson. But doctors shouldn't require a family crisis to understand the family's experience of health care. Health care that focuses only on the patient, and does not engage family, is woefully inadequate.
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https://montrealgazette.com/opinion/opinion-patients-families-are-more-than-just-visitors
