Crosscultural Doctoring

Book excerpt: While the title of the book seems to imply that is written for the medical field, it is certainly meant for the non medical professionals also. If you are considering a career change or early retirement, this book is for you. In Cross Cultural Doctoring you will read about my career as a successful obstetrician and gynecologist in academic medicine at a major university. You will read why I decided at age 55 to leave my position, jump into the unknown and get off the beaten path. I will relate how my wife, Anne, and I accomplished this and how I kept working for various lengths of time in a number of different cultural settings around the world and how we traveled extensively between assignments. The places we lived and worked in, include, Japan, Pakistan, Alaska, Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand, Chiapas Mexico, and St Lucia in the West Indies. The book is written as a series of loosely connected anecdotes, some medical, some non-medical. Some are funny and some are not so funny. When appropriate, I have added some reflections about our experiences. I try to convey to the reader the excitement we have felt about our adventures. I hope that the book will inspire readers, medical and non-medical, to consider at some point of their careers to take the step to get off the beaten path. Anne and I certainly have never regretted our choices and have never looked back. Reading this book might also inspire people with similar experiences than ours, to write and publish their story. I hope that you will enjoy reading the book as much as I have enjoyed writing it. One of the highlights of my medical work abroad has been the four months I volunteered at a small Catholic Hospital in Chiapas Mexico. The nuns there did an incredible job running the hospital for the impoverished Mayan population under difficult circumstances. They need all the help they can get. You can read about it in chapter 13 of the book.