Nothing feels more paradoxical than this — a cardiac surgeon doing his rounds, checking on patients who have come to him to mend failing hearts, hopeful of resurrection after a close brush with death. He would be assuring them that all is well, that recovery is on the way. And then, suddenly, the healer himself collapses, succumbing to the very ailment he was meant to cure with his therapeutic hands and words. The scene sounds surreal, yet it is becoming a chilling reality in India’s hospitals. Doctors are falling prey to a multitude of problems they cannot circumvent, often labelled as “pressures of the medical profession.”

Experts caution that doctors too need a life, offering advice on maintaining work–life balance even when one dons the mantle of lifesaver to hundreds, sometimes thousands. To pin this mammoth issue under the simple banner of “stress” would be........

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