Professor Dr. Muslim Uddin Sabuj

Prof. Dr. Muslim Uddin Sabuj is the head of pediatrics at CIMC. MBBS, DCH, MD. He gets the big office at the end of the hall. Probably has a heavy wooden desk with a glass top. Being the department head means doing a lot of paperwork. Signing leave applications for the junior doctors. Approving duty rosters. But he still sees patients. Mostly the complicated ones that the registrars cannot figure out. Parents bring in kids with fevers that have lasted a month. They carry those thick plastic bags full of old blood reports from different clinics. He just spreads the papers out on his desk. Pushes his glasses up. He does not order a bunch of new tests right away. Just asks the mother what the kid eats every day. Usually just rice and some broth. He tells them to add an egg. Simple stuff.

He leads the big morning rounds twice a week. A whole crowd of medical students and assistant professors walking behind him. The ward is always loud. Babies crying. He stops at a metal cot. Asks a third year student to check the liver size on a toddler. The student probably gets nervous and presses too hard. The kid cries louder. He just sighs a bit. Shows them how to do it gently with the edge of his fingers. Years of practice. He has seen pretty much every childhood disease in Chattagram by now. Typhoid from bad water. Malaria. Just regular seasonal stuff. He finishes the round. Tells the nurses to discharge bed number four. Walks back to his office. Sits down.