The following manuscript was submitted to the April 2017 Arts in Medicine Themed Writing Contest.
You won’t feel a thing, I said.
The port that’s been the avenue to his renewed life constantly reminds him of the struggle so recently endured. It juts out of his chest like an unwelcome, yet all too familiar stranger. In about an hour, it’ll be gone. Today’s a celebration because it means that treatment is over.
This eleven-year-old boy who’s fought through long days of chemo and even longer nights of uncertainty is flanked by his parents. He’s scared. I was, too.
His mother asks whether or not there will be a scar. I tell her yes. We’ll do our best to make it small, but there will be a scar.
“How big?” he asks.
I pull down the collar of my scrubs. “Look at mine.”
His mom’s eyes brim with tears. “You had the same thing he did?” I nod.
She turns to him. “See? Some day you can be a doctor, too.”
He looks at my scar. “That’s pretty badass.”
Resident Physician Contributing Writer
Columbia-New York Presbyterian Hospital
Jake Prigoff is originally from Roslyn, New York. He received his undergraduate degree from The University of Michigan and his medical degree from The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. He is currently a General Surgery Resident at Columbia University Medical Center in New York City. His primary career focus is on oncologic surgery, but his interests also include Public Health and the epidemic of gun violence in America.