First, I must say how grateful I was to discover that not long after our return home, significant health care reform legislation completed its arduous journey across the House floor and onto the President’s desk. I may have some detractors on this point, so I promise that I will not base the remainder of my reflection on political ground; however, the fact of the matter bears noticing, as I was eagerly following the developments of this bill throughout our week in Brevard, observing daily just how far its implications could possibly reach. I sincerely hope that the proposed reforms provide access to quality, affordable healthcare for the people of Brevard and similar towns while reducing the strain on The Free Clinic and its numerous counterparts nationwide.
As you all know, I focused my efforts primarily on the technical side of the mission, so I never had any direct contact with the patients we were serving. On one hand, I regret this omission on my part (as I believe that my learning process would have only been further enriched by such interaction), but on the other, I am grateful that the skills of our group were balanced in such a way that I was able to focus my attention solely on that unwieldy beast of a spreadsheet in all its various incarnations. While I am at it, thank you again to everyone who helped forge that framework, especially Charles, who helped me hit the ground running in our strategically-placed kitchen office on Monday morning.
During the week, I had several tête-à-têtes with various teammates regarding how we felt about our progress in meeting Gary’s initial goals. I was somewhat surprised to hear so many people voice their concerns that we were not accomplishing nearly enough to have truly served the clinic; however, as I ruminated, I began to understand that these concerns were born not necessarily of pessimism, but of a shared visceral desire to do far greater than our best possible work for the sake of everyone who stood to benefit from it. I sympathize with everyone’s fears entirely, for I could not help but remain fully conscious of my great fortune as a healthy, insured individual, and therefore felt deeply compelled to repay my “cosmic debt” (if you will) for that fortune.
Despite our ongoing battles against the sides of ourselves that still may not be fully convinced we did the best we could, I would like to make the strongest case possible in favor of our efforts, enumerated below:
- We faced a foreign, intimidating set of problems head-on.
- We established an excellent team rapport in what must be record time.
- We responded to as many of the clinic’s needs as we could possibly address, and even tried to anticipate staff requests before they were made.
- Did I reiterate that we did this all in less than one week?
