Is There A Doctor On The Plane?

Over at Wachter’s World, Bob Wachter, M.D., Associate Chairman of the Department of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco  relates what it’s like to be on a plane and hear the airplane’s PA system ask: “If there’s a doctor on board, please ring your call button!”

Wachter has been answering this request for some twenty years and offers a surprisingly candid, wonderfully funny, and ultimately reassuring description of how he has responded. Physicians are trained to be professionals, and most put patients’ interests first.