From Invisible to Visible - Positive Deviance Initiative

Healing a Person, Not a Body
“What can I do for you?” asked a Billings nurse
of a terminally-ill patient.
“Would you wheel me to the fish pond?” he
whispered.
Gazing at the trout for what seemed like an
hour, he murmured: “Now I can die in peace.”
After a pause, he smiled at the nurse and said:
“Fishing was my first love!”
During our three-day visit to Billings Clinic,
we heard the above story twice, narrated by
two different people, each rendering a slightly
different treatment. However, on both occasions
it evoked the same reflection – a line
from the movie, Patch Adams:
Fish gliding in the Trout Pond in the Atrium
“You treat a disease you win, you lose. You
treat a person, you win no matter what the outcome.”
Billings Clinic’s Healing Environment Program
combines the science and technology of medicine
with the aesthetics of the arts. Outside
the main building, sprawls a healing garden
with various plants, rocks, a flowing water
stream, and an exhibit about the Deaconess
Billings Clinic (the Clinic’s former name). One
slate discusses the Deaconess philosophy of The Healing Garden at Billings Clinic
nursing—treat the whole person—and shows a
figure of the Lady with the Lamp, Florence Nightingale. We learn that Nurse Nightingale, who many
believe was the second most famous Victorian in England after Queen Victoria herself, was trained
in the Deaconess system of training.
Billings’ focus on healing the person now makes even more sense.
We sit in the cafeteria, sipping Java coffee. The soothing sound of a baby grand piano comes on.
Adjacent to the cafeteria is the pharmacy. The counter is adorned by dozens of flower bouquets and
plants.
“Ah, being healed as one waits on one’s prescription,” we muse.
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