April 6, 2018 at 1:53 p.m.
PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES
Catholic surgeon educates on treating patients as people
"I was looking at all this technology that was being used to blow people up," Dr. Dutkowsky explained, "and I wondered what would happen if it was being used to help people with disabilities."
That wouldn't be the first time he felt God nudging him toward becoming an orthopedic surgeon, caring for children with disabilities like cerebral palsy, spina bifida, muscular dystrophy and Down syndrome. He trained at Brown University, Harvard and the Campbell Clinic in Memphis, then co-authored a textbook.
But Dr. Dutkowsky chose to ditch the path to becoming a "world-famous doctor" so his children could be close to relatives in his native western New York. For the past 18 years, he's seen patients at clinics associated with the Bassett Healthcare Network in Cobleskill, Delhi, Oneonta, Herkimer and Cooperstown. He and his wife, Karen, live in Cooperstown and attend St. Joseph the Worker parish in Richfield Springs/West Winfield.
We're all imperfect
The doctor didn't realize until recently that his choice of Martin as a confirmation name, referring to St. Martin de Porres, was prophetic: The saint was known for establishing a children's hospital and curing people.
But the 21st-century surgeon challenges the notion of curing or healing his patients.
"We've created this very false culture of perfection," Dr. Dutkowsky said. "The people I deal with are born imperfect. And I have news for everyone out there: We're all born imperfect. There's only one person who's perfect, and that's Jesus."
He said he spends 80 percent of his time just visiting with patients: "The day I hang up my scalpel, I won't shed a tear. My job is to try to bring the love of God. Sometimes all they need me to do is to sit and listen, to show that [they're] important."
In the past five years, Dr. Dutkowsky has also practiced twice a week at Columbia University's Weinberg Family Cerebral Palsy Center in New York City, where he teaches specialists and medical students how to treat patients with disabilities, focusing on the whole patient rather than just the person's physical ailments. He just finished training the entire dental school.
More than illness
"I don't see [patients] as bones and joints and muscles," Dr. Dutkowsky said. "They're people who want to learn, who want to have friends. They're people who want to have intimacy in life. They want what you want. I don't even see [the disability] anymore. I just see the person.
"I can do this all I want up here, but if you do it in the Big Apple, people notice," he added.
He uses his four-hour drive downstate to pray the Rosary and clear his head. All the extra work, he said, is "worth it. If I fail, what's the cost?"
Dr. Dutkowksy was featured in the New York Times and PBS' Religion and Ethics Newsweekly program this year about his work and views on the dignity of people with disabilities. He also educates community groups and spoke on the topic at a conference on faith and medicine during his third pilgrimage to Lourdes, France.
"I speak for people who can't [always] speak for themselves," he explained. "We get our dignity in life by the fact that we are all creatures of God. There's no separate cross for cerebral palsy or Down syndrome."
Big picture
The doctor said one of the biggest misconceptions about people with CP is that they're cognitively impaired.
"If all you see is that person who's walking differently from you, then you don't see the whole picture," Dr. Dutkowsky said. In fact, the first thing he asks pediatric patients about is their grades.
Some people also assume CP is merely a pediatric condition, since there was a time when adults with CP were confined to institutions, but 60 percent of Dr. Dutkowsky's New York City patients are adults.
Dr. Dutkowsky's patients have taught him "to learn to accept myself," he said.
He said he cherishes what he calls "Grand Canyon" moments, when a child surprises him with a hug, a picture or a profound statement.
"How privileged am I to be standing here?" he thinks. "How in the world did God choose me? They're sharing themselves with me. They're being courageous enough to be vulnerable. What is a greater gift?"[[In-content Ad]]
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