All Hail the Queen
On the heels of Prince William of Wales’s marriage to Kate Middleton, I reminisce on a memorable clinical experience. On the first day of my Psychiatry core rotation, I met the “Queen of England.” She was a middle-aged black man. This was beyond unusual, yet slightly curious. I had read about psychoses, but to actually witness this individual’s delusion was frightening. This was a rare moment in which I witnessed a classic textbook case of a syndrome come to life.
For my first patient of the day, I was charged with the duty of obtaining a history and physical examination from an individual who thought he was a ruling monarch! My interview never commenced: the “Queen” proceeded to become agitated. The attending physician joined the interview and was able to collect the medical information that eluded me. At best, the prognosis for the “Queen’s” condition was dismal; his symptoms could be controlled, but not eradicated. A humbling realization of clinical rotations (and I am sure in future clinical practice as well) is that many patients will not be cured. We, as future physicians, must aim to improve quality of life, since we are often unable to effect quantity of life. Even the life of a queen.
