Humor In Basic Clinical Skills By Melvin Konner

In the next stanza, the poet describes “A figure walking towards cloaked in blue/ Beeping/ Tubes/ Needles.” The poem addresses the routinely and monotonous aspect of being in the hospital for long periods of time. It is a critique of the biomedical model and how the hospital system is created where patients are tended to by multiple doctors, nurses, and allied health professionals. The patients and healthcare professionals are unable to form a relationship that consists of what Kleinman describes as “empathetic witnessing” (Kleinman). Therefore, detachment between patient and health workers is developed and established, to which the patient cannot recognize or know the people assisting them. In addition, Grealy discusses this in her earliest accounts and appointments with doctors. She states that there is a layer of “condescension” and is an “endemic in the medical

This role does not only allow me to shadow doctors while they engage with patients, providing an opportunity to gain invaluable information and advises. This role requires most of my attention towards patients’ needs, which helps to establish a professional relationship and understand what they expect a doctor to be: caring and sensitive but decisive. As English is not my first language, my bilingual skills give me a chance to help some patients through being a translator. It is not the dream job anyone imagines, hours of sleepless shifts, tremendous responsibility with no room for errors as dealing with fragile lives and not products. This only further strengthens my decision to pursue medicine. What I most admire is how empathetic a doctor can be yet unaffected during a critical situation. It is more than just a skill; it is a talent.

In the medical world, physician-patient interactions are vital to the development of relationships between physicians and patients. For this paper, I observed a Pediatrician’s interaction with three very different patients. Even within Pediatrics, doctors see children of many different ages and have to adjust their communication methods and skills depending on specific situations. In this paper, I shall be discussing 3 of the interactions that I observed, which included a regular checkup for an 18 month baby, a yearly checkup for an 8 year old boy, and a sick 11 year old boy. From these experiences, which I shall describe more in detail throughout this paper, I learned that the majority of the concepts that we explored this year through this class play major roles in affecting physician-patient encounters in the real world and that each and every patient encounter is unique, because physicians tailor their skills and behavior based on the context and situation of the interaction.

In spite of this, technological advances in medicine began to cause doctors to move further away from developing a relationship with their patients and to begin paying more attention to the equipment instead. “The Doctor” directed by Randa Haines depicts the fall and rebuilding of physician and patient relationships as the protagonist John McKee, a surgeon who once showed disrespect and scorn towards his patients, sees the hospital through their eyes when he is diagnosed with cancer in the vocal chords. The surgeon’s in the movie is “Get in, fix it, get out.” The credo shows that patients are treated as lesser beings much in the same way that Nurse Ratchet treats her patients in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”. When McKee and his colleague Murray Kaplan are working with a patient who has a scar on her chest, the patient confides in McKee that she and her husband are not close anymore. McKee merely responds that she should tell her husband that she is like the centerfolds in the playboy magazines because of her staples. McKee insults the patient in ridicule much like Nurse Ratchet does to the patients in the mental hospital further displaying how the physician-patient relationship has dwindled emotionally. McKee shows no sympathy even for those who suffer from serious illness. In the chapter titled “Big Boys Do Cry: Empathy in The Doctor” by Lucy Fischer from the book “Cultural Sutures: Medicine and Media” Fischer states: “Further contributing to this transition in medical practice was the professional assumption that, as highly (and expensively) trained scientists, physicians made better use of their valuable time ordering and interpreting test results than focusing on personal interaction” (150). What this implies is that because medicine keeps advancing with technology, the physician tends to focus more on the tools being

During the month of November it was quite difficult to find the time to observe Dr. Weisman. Between both of our hectic schedules, it was actually impossible to find the time. In spite of the hectic schedules, I devoted more time to reflect on my skills. . These skills include, asking qualifying questions, and writing high grade memorandums. These skills may seem superficial, however in the medical field, there are harsh terms. Sometimes, finding time for effective communication and asking questions is difficult. I reach out to teachers and family members to assist me in forming solid questions and jotting down stellar grade notes.

This once-popular perception of medicine is in a sense antiquated. Still, by admitting that there exists a discrepancy between the past and present views of the patient-doctor dynamic, the expanding role of the patient can be recognized.

This essay tried to illustrate the double-edged dimension of storytelling in the physician-patient relationship. Telling and listening to stories is part of our lives: narratives are very powerful component of our way of leading and sharing life. They put our autobiography against others’ ones, and in turn others will recount their story about our biography. How many versions of the same story can we produce? How much credibility do our narratives have? All these concerns starkly sum up in asymmetric relations, like the one between a clinician and her patient. On the one hand, it is difficult to be on the same wavelength, because of different backgrounds, social identities, roles, lexicon, and interests at stake. However, cooperation in the narrative enterprise can be extremely beneficial from both sides. To put oneself in the others’ shoes requires patience, empathy, and imagination. Nonetheless, communication is always imperfect, biased, especially when individuals are in a vulnerable position. And patients are vulnerable, in need of care, in a relation of dependence to their physician. However, the patient storyteller can be wounded or

How Doctors Think, by Jerome Groopman, MD, is a symposium, or collection of articles, that approaches the thought process of a medical practitioner before, during, and after a diagnosis. He did not write this novel to criticize other physicians, but rather so that the patients who go to their doctors may open their eyes and learn how physicians actually think and how to assist their doctor so that mistakes in their diagnosis become less common. Dr. Groopman mentions that 10 to 15 percent of diagnoses are incorrect, showing us that doctors can do much better, and can improve upon the accuracy of their diagnosis. In addition, Dr. Groopman examines many of the mistakes physicians make by using tangible, real life, examples from his own medical misadventures, both as a doctor and as a patient. For example, he notes that he had at one point developed something in his right hand that caused a severe amount of pain in his wrist anytime he put pressure on it. So, just as any patient with a medical problem, he went to his physician to receive a diagnosis. Little did he know that he would spend years trying to solve this problem, and also have to go to four physicians in order to receive the correct treatment. Each physician he went to gave a different diagnosis; one said he had a “hyperactive synovium” (not a real clinical condition), another said he had a hairline fracture and would need three surgeries and two years to fully recover. The next said that he had chondrocalcinosis,

The book touches on everyday medical issues that we, as medical professionals, have accepted as a norm. Atul discusses his personal experiences and questions his own profession which, personally, can only better you more in your profession. “No matter what

“Another Patient Jumped Out Of the Window.” I put down the newspaper and uneasily glanced at the patient resting by my side for whose comfort I was responsible. It was the winter of my junior year, my second week working in a state-controlled Chinese hospital. On the first day, without going through any training, I met Yuping, a sixty-year old pancreas cancer victim and also a mother of six. Estranged from her family due to high medical expenditure, none of her children had shown up in days; I filled their roles. I fed her, took her out for some fresh air and tried to chat with her, but she rarely talked. She spent her time staring at the plain ceiling and listening the anxious voices from the hallway. Sitting at her bedside and thinking about that disturbing news headline, I began to experience a sense of desperation. I was sickened by the emotional neglect that Yuping experienced, but no matter how I tried, I could not reach into the heart of this suffering lady. This was the dark side of medicine that I had never seen before. Right then, I questioned myself, ”Do I really want to be a doctor?”

We dedicate years of our lives to attending school in an attempt to gain knowledge. This knowledge comes to life during our day-to-day interactions with people. In healthcare, this knowledge ends up being a small element of patient care. Those chemical reactions and disease pathways we so thoughtfully memorized suddenly are transformed by a patient’s story. Each patient has a social, economic, emotional, physical and cultural history that makes medical care much more than just writing a prescription to fix a disease.

In recent years, the idea that humor can serve as an important part of health has been popularized through both the media and the general public. From Kaiser Permanente 's Thrive campaign to a rise in studies on the correlation between happy and healthy lives, happiness and positivity has taken a step into the spotlight as a current day medical issue. Although it has only recently because popularized among the public, the idea that humor provides health benefits has been expressed many times in the past. In Shakespeare 's Taming of the Shrew, a messenger claims that "mirth and merriment... bars a thousand harms and lengthens life", and in the bible, Proverbs 17:22 says that "a merry heart doeth good like medicine". Today, several studies have shown how laughter and happiness can have positive effects on both mental and physical health, through physiological and emotional factors.

During the second year of medical school the changeover from a classroom atmosphere to the clinical wards and outpatient clinics changed my impression towards my profession. I began to understand the need to practice in medicine not just theories from books will do. As I was posted through various specialties, I found that each has its exemplary ways of dealing with disease.

Ivan Illich said that medical professional practice is indeed a threat to health and identified a syndrome he call the medical nemesis (Blaxter, 2010). The history of medical professional practice along with its major threats to health will be discussed in the essay. In addition, this essay will further highlight, with suitable examples, how these major threats are confounded in everyday society with or without the knowledge of the public. Good professional practice will be explained and compared to the actual threats experienced in real life. In addition, examples will be provided to further explain how medical practice is a major threat to health.

It’s 9am and little Saigon is bustling. I’m five years old and sick with a cold. My mother drives us to our family physician – the same doctor who has cared for me my whole life. The medical assistant takes me through the basic routine, then my physician and his wife greet us with warm hugs. I have my regular check-up and we are off to the pharmacy. Within the week, I’m feeling like my normal self. Our family physician gave me my first glimpse of how a medical practice operates, from patient care to building a relationship and trust with their patients. The care and treatment I received sparked my interest in medicine.