I don't have a single moment to share. Instead, like a very good GP, Dr Helen Noble, who has been my GP and friend for many years, offers a number of important gifts to the community she serves. And serves if the word. She could be in an urban area, being less connected to the human beings who are her patients and making much more money. Instead, she practices with diligence, kindness, continual research and discretion in our small rural community. Perhaps because she is in a small rural community, she knows her patients both in the examining room, where she takes the time and focus to listen, a gift to the people who depend on her and the habitual practice of a knowledgable and caring physician. She cares and works hard to balance the medial realities with her individual patient's realities, all the while maintaining discretion among the people she knows. It is a burden on a human being, perhaps, but one of the signs of a very good doctor. Recruiting good, caring and skilled general practitioners to a rural community is difficult for all the reasons I mentioned above – lower pay, the demands of a discipline that its both art and science and requires continual learning, the emotional connection to patients while maintaining the dispassionate distance to help them make the best decision in their individual circumstances, and the need to keep one's ears open while keeping one's mouth shut. All the Helen exhibits in spades. She has been a gift to this community and to her patients and for that I give thanks.
Patient of Helen A. Noble, MD, FACP
