On 23rd June 2010 afternoon, there was a gathering of Filipino patients in our meeting room. In recent years, more and more patients from thePhilippinescome to our hospital for treatment. At one time there were as many as 70 plus Filipino patients at our hospital. They always gather together either at the meeting room or in the canteen. Sometime they would request our services department to arrange for them to meet outside the hospital. They would share on their treatment experience and sometimes they would invite priests and pastors to conduct religious services and activities. However, this afternoon’s activity was more special because they had invited, Mr. Glenn F. Gorpin, the Chief Administrative officer of the Philippines Consulate General in Guangzhou to come, and I was invited, too.
The first to speak was Mr. Nestor, a Filipino-American. He said, “All of us are children of God. We must be grateful and give thanks to God who has given us life. We also want to thank Fuda Cancer Hospital for giving us hope for a new lease of life. We must help others who need help with a grateful heart.” He further said, “All the Filipino patients in Fuda Cancer Hospital are volunteers. We want more people to know about the hospital, to let them know that here you can find hope for an extension of your life.”
Mr. Nestor, a retired company executive, sixty-nine years old, is a Filipino who lives in California. Six years ago he was diagnosed with prostate cancer with lymph node and bone metastasis. He received chemotherapy and endocrine therapy; the disease was under control for a while but soon it deteriorated. March 2009, Nestor was admitted into our hospital and was given partial cryosurgery of prostate, vascular intervention and systemic immunotherapy. The lesions disappeared. October the same year, the grateful Nestor returned to Manila. With the help of his brother, he organized a medical forum on cancer treatment at the Peninsular Hotel, the best hotel in Manila. It was attended by more than 500 people. Dr. Mufeng and I were invited as the main speakers. During the next three days, we gave free consultations to more than 150 patients. In recent years, Mr. Nestor continues to engage himself in providing voluntary publicity on cancer treatment. As he said jokingly, he has apparently become “Half a Doctor”.
Today’s gathering was for the launching of a website set up by some volunteers from thePhilippines. After Mr. Nestor’s speech, the contents of the website were shown in a big screen in the meeting room. The domain name was “Philippines Volunteers for Fuda, PVF”. It was designed by a Filipino-American couple, Mike Dionisio, the husband and Chonatrivinio Dionisio CCC, the wife. The wife suffered from Ewing’s sarcoma of the right kidney with lung metastasis. She was admitted into our hospital last year. After she was discharged, she and her husband started to design the website. The website’s contents comprised of sharing by cancer patients on their treatment and their hospitalization experience and the unique cancer treatment they had received.
What are volunteers? The United Nations defines it as “People who voluntarily undertake activities not with self-interest, financial reward and fame as their goals, but to contribute towards the community and world at large.” They are people who, at their own free will, scarify their time and energy to perform their social duties and responsibilities without getting any materialistic reward in return. Volunteers are good examples of love. They are not commanders, educators but ones who use their life to influence others’ life, to give love and to dissimilate civilization. This love and civilization are passed on from one person to another, and will accumulate and turn into a strong and warm current of love for the society.
I finally understand the real meaning of volunteerism. In this world, money is important but it is not everything and neither is the most important thing. We need a noble spirit and love. Volunteers exist since ancient times. The giving of free medicine at ancient times was the prototype of volunteerism. Besides this website, I learn that some Danish patients who have been discharged have set up blogs to dissimilate news about our hospital and to share their treatment experience together. In fact, these volunteers are doing marketing services for our hospital.
I am very grateful to them for doing all this voluntarily. They do not ask for any financial rewards and return; they are volunteers who want to help others. For us whose duty is the save the dying and heal the sick, we should work even harder to show great love to the world through our medical practice. Let us be touched by the noble spirit exhibited by these volunteers and to achieve our own quality enhancement.