My father, a urologist, has thought carefully about how to avert such uncertainties. From the start, he told me, he felt the fragility of his standing as an outsider, an Indian immigrant practicing in our small southern Ohio town. In the absence of guidelines to reassure patients that what he does as a urologist is routine, he made painstaking efforts to avoid any question. The process begins before the examination. He always arrives in a tie and white coat. He is courtly. Although he often knows patients socially and doesn’t hesitate to speak with them about private matters (the subjects can
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