Treating normotensive hypertension

I think that the physician was trying to convince me that there were problems with the hospital. Personally, I didn’t need convincing. I was only too aware of the inadequacies of this government hospital where I, as an aid worker, was trying to work alongside the government staff. Perhaps, though, I did need to learn a lesson about my Western approach to diagnosis and treatment.

He had invited me into his consulting room to see a few patients and had promptly disappeared, leaving me to run the clinic. The first patient I saw complained of “hypertension.” Through my translator …