You can teach anatomy, physiology, pharmacology, and surgical technique. You can teach leadership, finance, and business strategy. But I’m not convinced you can teach compassion.

You either feel it, or you don’t.

If you don’t, healthcare is probably not where you should be.

I spent many years in hospital administration. I enjoyed the challenge, and I believe it is absolutely possible to have both sound business judgment and deep compassion. In fact, healthcare desperately needs leaders with both. But if business is all you bring to the table, there are many industries where those talents would be better suited.

I always missed patient care.

The more I reflect on my years in healthcare, the less I remember the procedures I performed and the more I remember the people.

I remember sitting quietly at a bedside after delivering bad news and simply letting the silence do its work.

I remember holding a hand when words weren’t enough.

I remember celebrating with patients when the news was good and grieving with them when it wasn’t.

Some of the most important moments in healthcare require no prescription, no procedure, and no extraordinary medical knowledge.

They simply require someone willing to be fully present.

My wife has taught me something I’ve carried into every part of my life. When people come to you with a problem, they aren’t always asking you to fix it.

They’re asking you to listen.

To care.

To acknowledge what they’re feeling.

Patients are no different.

Too often we walk into a room, ask a few questions, explain a diagnosis, outline a treatment plan, and move on to the next patient. We’ve become incredibly efficient.

Sometimes we’ve become so efficient that we’ve forgotten the person lying in that bed is frightened, overwhelmed, and trying to make sense of a life that may have just changed forever.

I’ve watched physicians tell someone they have cancer and then immediately begin discussing staging, chemotherapy, radiation, surgery, and survival statistics.

The physician believes they’ve communicated everything.

The patient heard one word.

Cancer.

Everything after that became background noise.

People need time to process.

They need someone to recognize the fear on their face.

They need permission to ask the same question three times because they couldn’t hear the answer the first two.

They need someone who can simply read the room.

You don’t always have to lay hands on a patient to help heal them, but never underestimate the power of human touch—a hand on a shoulder, a hand held during uncertainty, or a quiet presence that says, You’re not facing this alone.

Medicine will continue to advance. Artificial intelligence will become more accurate. Treatments will improve. Technology will transform almost everything about healthcare.

But one thing should never change.

Every patient deserves to know someone sees them.

Someone acknowledges what they’re going through.

Someone is willing to help carry the weight of that moment, even if only for a few minutes.

Sometimes that’s as therapeutic as anything we can prescribe.

Perhaps one day we’ll measure compassion with the same seriousness that we measure infection rates, readmissions, and patient falls. Not because compassion fits neatly into a spreadsheet, but because it matters just as much.

Patients rarely remember their potassium level or their white blood cell count.

But they never forget how you made them feel.

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Roger D. Forgey, FACHE, is a retired healthcare executive, nurse practitioner, and Army Lieutenant Colonel with more than 40 years of experience in healthcare leadership. During his career, he served as CEO of multiple hospitals and held senior leadership roles with Erlanger Health System and other regional healthcare organizations. A Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives, Forgey has spent his career leading hospitals through growth, change, and crisis. Today, he enjoys writing thoughtful columns on life, leadership, healthcare, faith, and the issues that shape our communities. He lives in Northwest Georgia with his wife. He can be reached at rogerforgey@gmail.com.