After several years of working in the hospital system, bouncing around from specialty to specialty, harassed, overworked and jaded; I became eager to leave. So I began as a General Practice Registrar. My time spent roaming the hospital corridors were replaced with sitting in an office as I saw patients, one after another, 15 minutely. After a little while, their names and faces blurred, as did their problems and conditions. But every so often, a few patients would stand out, and even rarer still, some have gone on to shape me, as both a doctor and as a human being.

One such patient saw me early on in my general practice training. She was a lady in her eighties, but I never thought of her as elderly. Her husband of many years had just passed away less than one month ago after battling bowel cancer in a cruel and agonising struggle. She came to see me because she was desperately depressed. She felt alone and trapped. She longed to be with her husband and missed her children deeply after they had gone back to their lives’ interstate following their stepfather’s funeral. Slowly her mood lifted as she opened up to her family and friends and bravely fought her depression. And then I didn’t see her for a while…

The next time I saw her, she had a cough. It was dry and irritating. She admitted she recently had a cold and felt like her cough was lingering from that. She said she otherwise felt well. Almost off-handedly I asked if she had lost any weight recently and she said yes. The cough had been there for over a month. I listened to her lungs, nothing sounded odd. I told her we would get a chest x-ray just to be safe. Her x-ray showed a shadow on the surface of her lung that was highly suspicious of a mesothelioma – a vicious form of lung cancer related to asbestos exposure.

I saw her the next day and told her the result. I asked her if she had ever been exposed to asbestos and she told me of how, many years ago, her husband who was a former labourer, worked in buildings that were laced with asbestos, and how she would do his washing every weekend. I told her we would need to do further tests to clarify the diagnosis. I tried to give her some hope.

After further imaging, specialist reviews and biopsies, our fears were confirmed: mesothelioma. She took the news with grace. She had already decided, that if it was cancer, she did not want to fight an agonising battle like her husband. She wanted the time she had left to be on her terms.  

Death is a certainty for all of us, but it was a bizarre thing to watch someone acknowledge and accept their near fate with a quiet dignity.  That’s what she did. That’s what I hope I helped her to do. Near the end, when she became too weak to walk, and needed oxygen around the clock to help her feel like she wasn’t drowning, I visited her weekly at her home. Her family came from all over to see her and spend time with their grandmother and mother. She passed away in her sleep on a night when most of her family had gathered to see her and spend the night at her home. Three months from diagnosis to death. Three months of preparing for the end. Three months of conversations and reconciliations, of love and caring. I don’t think any death is ‘good’, but this was a case of it being as ‘good’ as it can get.