Really

This question struck me after I spent months trapped in a bizarre experimental phenomenon regarding material encapsulation. I was utterly confused, constantly doubting myself: should we just add anti-inflammatory components to every single implant to inhibit fibrosis-related factors?

Then today, I came across an article about mechanical forces and fibrosis, and it completely shocked me. I realized I had never once considered the impact of physical stretch or surgical sutures. For the past few months, it felt like I had a leaf over my eyes, blocking me from seeing the elephant in the room. I did know the adhesive model made using only sutures, but I attributed it solely to oxygen deficiency due to vascular blockage. It was only when I read that paper that I realized this model may also be taking advantage of mechanical force.

Learning about endometriosis, I suddenly felt sorry for those endometrial cells. In the wrong place, their intended work becomes a disaster rather than a contribution.

I mean, when I look at these misplaced cells on a tissue slide, I know we should remove them so the body can function better. But for those cells, it feels like a tragedy.

They’re perfectly healthy cells. If anything, they are sometimes more capable than their correctly placed peers. But location changes everything. In the wrong spot, they go from helpful to harmful.

The same happens to people. You see someone incredibly talented, yet destiny or some absurd twist of timing, some weird accident of fate, makes them an outcast, or worse, a threat. They end up unwanted, their talent rendered useless, or dismissed as a misuse of skill that only invites disaster like a farmer learning governing a country. The ability itself isn’t the problem. It’s the complete mismatch between what they’re good at and what the situation demands.

I MUST SAY: Hospital field trips should be compulsory, because everyone gets dumber the moment they step through the hospital gates.

For a long time, this question has stuck with me.
It started when I volunteered at a hospital two years ago, helping patients and their families with all kinds of questions. And I mean all kinds:

How do I register?
How do I get a refund?
When and where should I get this test done?
Which way do I go? (Even though there are enough signs to mark every single direction.)
Which department should I see based on my symptoms?
Why haven’t my test results come out yet?

I couldn’t blame anyone for this. It was only after I entered medical school that I realized: we were never really taught how to behave in a hospital, either as a patient or a family member.

We all know that when we are sick, we should go to the hospital. We also played "visiting a doctor" back in kindergarten. And that, is the entire lesson. But the actual practice, including the procedures of registering, getting an exam or even surgery, the necessity of waiting, where to seek help instead of simply make a complaint via 12315. We learn none of it. And it becomes even harder when we are stressed and worried about the disease itself.

The procedure of “visiting a doctor” may sound easy, but in real world the system of hospital is complicated. What’s worse, for patients and their families, it would be really hard to learn or think through in the moment.

We should make it common sense, so that questions like these disappear: Where do I register? How do I cancel an appointment? Which way do I go? How does a hospital actually work? And why aren’t most mistakes the doctor’s fault?

I’ve had enough of the current approach: doctors are repetitively taught to be more patient, clearer, more accessible (which we should still do), and everything patients do should be understood and tackled by hospital staff. Why not educate patients directly before they ever become patients?

When I came up with this “hospital visit education” idea, I was shocked that no one had done this, or at least no one had talked about it. Yet it seems so obvious. An actual trip to a local hospital really helps, instead of a pretend exercise in a classroom.

So I went to search for any prior study about this. It turns out that there is a whole academic field called “health literacy”, where researchers care about people’s ability to access, understand, and use health information. And there’s data supporting that better health literacy improves health outcomes, reduces medication errors, and even lowers ER visits.

And actually “no one” is my illusion. There are already educational intervention attempts. Some schools have implemented health literacy programs for adolescents, with real success, around the world.

Organizing such field trips is hard, as it adds work for schools and hospital staff. But it’s necessary, just like other missing pieces in our education: how to pay insurance, how local institutions work, and how to ask for help. It is time for us to bring these topics into compulsory education without simply dumping more burden on frontline workers.

We teach kids to cross streets safely. We should also teach them to walk through hospital gates without losing their minds. The first time you truly need these skills, you’ll be scared, in pain, or in a hurry. That’s no time to learn. That’s why such learning should happen in compulsory education.

For the longest time, I thought “scar” covered everything: the dry brown thing, the pink mark underneath, all of it. Do not laugh at me, as I did not learn pathology at that time, and I’m not a native English speaker.

Then I read a sentence about “reducing scarring, edema, and crusting” and got confused. Why put crusting and scarring together? Aren’t they the same thing at different stages?

It turns out to be no. I had been using “scar” as a lazy umbrella term.

Crust vs. Scar – A Quick Comparison

My “Aha” Moment

I used to see a scab, think “that’s the beginning of a scar”, and mentally merge them.

At that time I realized, You can get rid of the crust, but the scar will stay. They are totally not the same thing.

And that sentence makes perfect sense now: the material reduces early crusting, swelling, and late scarring. By suppressing early crusting, it lowers the chances of the material tearing or ripping the new wound, which could cause re-bleeding. As protective as a crust is for the body, it simply doesn’t work well when a filler material is packed into the wound. Haha.

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