My ice-breaking speech

Knock! Knock!

Sudden knocks on the door.

It was almost eleven o'clock at night.

Dr.Kitagawa, wondering who it was, put down his coffee cup on the desk and opened the door.

There were two men standing there, who said,

"Dr.Kitagawa, we are from Tokyo Metropolitan Police department. We are sorry to say, Doctor, you are under arrest."

At the police station, the officer explained the reason of his arrest in detail. One of his patients died just after his operation. Dr. Kitagawa, chief surgeon, and his colleagues did their best but they could not save the patient life.

Doctor and the hospital office explained the medical situation in which the patient was in and that they did their best as health care professionals, but the patient's family did not satisfied with it.

They  laid a complaint before the police. Then the police decided to accuse Dr.Kitagawa of  ”Negligent homicide”.

That was the very beginning of the long story.

It took more than 4 years to prove there was nothing to be accused on the doctors' side.

And Dr.Kitagawa, through his tough experience of the legal matter in the court, made up his mind to devote the rest of his life to the establishment of "MADR" in Japan.

Ladies and gentlemen, have you ever heard of "MADR"? It is a shortened form of "Medical Alternative Dispute Resolution”"which works as a mediator between the doctors and patients and tries to find the resolution not by the court struggle but by discussion and compromise.

He did his best for its establishment, but just after the handing down of decision of his innocence, because of the hardship of the legal battle in the court, Dr.Kitagawa suddenly passed away.

Some years passed after his death.

One high school student came to visit my school. My school is a Pre-Med school. Our job is to take care of the students whose hope is to enter a medical college to become a doctor in the future.

The student, whose face I vaguely remembered, asked me to let him enter the school. When I asked his name, he said, "My name is Kitagawa."

I said, "Oh, you are the only son of Dr,Kitagawa. I saw you when you were a kindergarten boy!"

"Yes, it's me. Mr.Toyama, I want to be a doctor. Can I enter your school?"

"Of course you can, if you like. But... was that your dream to be a doctor? I remember Dr. Kitagawa said you were going to be a jurnalist?"

He answered, "Yes, that was my dream. But after my father's death, I changed my mind. I made up my mind to be a doctor and will realize Father's dream to establish MADR here in Jpana."

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Ladies and gentlemen, in Japan, medical tradition is handed down from generation to generation like this. I am very proud of my position as a director of the Pre-Med school and being able to help and support them to be a good doctor in the future.

Thank you very much.