I recently watched this movie in full length and was awestruck.There’s need to admit here that I tend to be overly romantic about tailoring. Although I was a tailors apprentice from age 15 to 18 and didn’t like the apprentice situation with a young master who struggled too hard for authority with us young lads, I still have a very high regard for this craft and it’s artisanship. Attending Professor Roger Kneebone’s symposium on interprofessionalism and doing science with our hands in London’s Imperial college as a panelist and reading many of his articles ( “Making medicine bespoke”) I reflect on my own profession as anaesthesiologist more in the terms of aiming for mastership, creativity and professional pride. This alternative mold of thought helps greatly, I find.
One thing’s for sure, next time I talk to the trainees at my institute we will watch this sequence because it condenses so many thoughts I think many of them are not exposed to any more.
Let me outline without being farfetched: the explanations about making a suit bespoke for a customer with all his individuality exactly underscores what the ideal anaesthesia would be like- an individual inner gown for a specific situation in the customer’s /patient’s life.
If Master Ciro Palermo talks about the need to have passion for ones own craft-“CI VUOLE LA PASSION!”, what could be added?
That mastership only comes through sacrifice, long working hours but it also leads you to know what you and your product are worth. As Master Antonio Leonelli aptly puts it at the end of the trailer: ” What’s this gown worth? There’s so many things in this craft but many don’t know it ( “Quanto vale o’vest? Ci sono tante cose in questo mestiere, ma non tutto lo sanno, purtroppo).
As a last thing let me point out how old all these masters are-some go to their workshop until the day they die! The proverb says that tailors don’t retire!
How many anaesthesiologists do you know who cherish their work that much?