apology

I'm reading Aaron Lazare's "On Apology". One of the apologies he discussed really struck me and brought to mind what I've read about many adverse medical event situations. The story involved an 82 year old man who was the son of Holocaust victims. The man sued the French National Railroad System for its part in deporting 76,000 Jews from France to the concentration camps.
The compensation he requested: one Euro and acknowledgment by the railroad that it played an active role in the deportation. Noone could say that all he cared about was the money.

While doing research for my dissertation, I found an accumulation of evidence that many patients/families litigated medical malpractice cases to find out what happened and to protect future patients from the same mistakes. The money was secondary. Just think about what that says about our communities, our humanity. This, of course, is not to suggest that patients/families should not seek compensation, just to point out how important acknowledgment and helping others are for injured patients/families.