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The health lessons of a lifetime: what “wellbeing” means to me

Greg McCallum
Med J Aust 2011; 194 (4): S11. || doi: 10.5694/j.1326-5377.2011.tb02935.x
Published online: 21 February 2011

Greg has had a lifetime of interacting with the health system with both acute injuries and chronic diseases. For the past 4 years, as Secretary to the Board of the Australian e-Health Research Centre, he has been hearing about how e-health will improve his experience of dealing with health problems. This personal perspective suggests that patients will only consider an e-health system a success if it supports them in their treatment options and empowers them to look after themselves — Supplement Editors

The constructive curmudgeon

In 1969–1970, the renal transplant unit at Princess Alexandra Hospital, Brisbane, had an admirable approach — “patient heal thyself”. Self-reliance was the key, right down to sometimes taking one’s own blood pressure while in hospital for dialysis. I was encouraged to be independent of mind, and that was 40 years ago.

When I emerged from transplant surgery, I immediately took the view that I wasn’t going to live my life focusing on my one notable medical oddity. So, no transplant societies, no transplant games, no involvement in the ongoing life of the transplant unit or its heirs and successors. I do make an exception for the occasional PR appearance because I know the benefits that accrue from the program. And this happy old rationalist would also admit to himself, as I’m doing now to you, that there was, and is, an underlying superstition that I might cruel my good luck by talking about it or parading it too much.

I made another decision . . . that I wasn’t going to live my life constantly explaining myself to people. I’d had quite enough of that during dialysis, fending off offended suburban hosts and hostesses when I wouldn’t — couldn’t — eat or drink anything they offered me, to the point where I decided not to go out anywhere. You can easily start to live your life through your medical condition — that is the path of least resistance, because everyone wants to talk about it. The ready and increasing availability of web-based information can feed that interest, as can blanket use of particular interventions. An example is counselling, but with my lengthy experience at the other end of the scalpel, my domestic support team already know how to get me through these things.

  • Greg McCallum1

  • Australian e-Health Research Centre, CSIRO ICT Centre, Brisbane, QLD.


Correspondence: David.Hansen@csiro.au

Competing interests:

None identified.

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