Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The Healing Touch: Keeping the Doctor-Patient Relationship Alive Under Managed Care
    The Healing Touch: Keeping the Doctor-Patient Relationship Alive Under Managed Care
    The Healing Touch: Keeping the Doctor-Patient Relationship Alive Under Managed Care
    Ebook90 pages1 hour

    The Healing Touch: Keeping the Doctor-Patient Relationship Alive Under Managed Care

    By David L. Cram

    5/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    The traditional doctor-patient relationship is in jeopardy. In an era of hurry up medicine and patient quotas, health care professionals are no longer able to apply good bedside manner—the healing touch. As the focus shifts from patients to profits, this vital component of patient care diminishes and may eventually be lost. In The Healing Touch, David Cram, M.D., a master clinician, teaches the art of good bedside manner and offers a valuable resource for health care professionals striving to preserve the doctor-patient relationship.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherIndependent Publishers Group
    Release dateSep 1, 2012
    ISBN9781938803567
    The Healing Touch: Keeping the Doctor-Patient Relationship Alive Under Managed Care

    Read more from David L. Cram

    Related to The Healing Touch

    Related ebooks

    Medical For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Class of COVID-19

      Jan 8, 2021

      Class of COVID-19
      10 min read

    • Article

      Learning To Breathe

      Apr 16, 2023

      Learning To Breathe
      9 min read

    • Article

      Inside Intensive Care

      Jul 9, 2020

      Inside Intensive Care
      3 min read

    • Article

      Opinion: Moral Injury And Burnout In Medicine: A Year Of Lessons Learned

      Jul 26, 2019

      Applying the concept of "moral injury" to medicine offers insight into the burnout experienced by all types of health care professionals. Tell your story or, even better, your solutions.

      5 min read

    • Article

      A Long Engagement

      Jul 21, 2019

      If you’re well-educated and relatively wealthy, you’re much more likely to live a long life, with many more disease-free years. If you’re less fortunate, both in terms of your education and means, you won’t fare as well. Unfortunately, the disparity

      3 min read

    • Article

      A Taste Of Your Own Medicine

      Mar 1, 2024

      A Taste Of Your Own Medicine
      2 min read

    • Article

      The Integrating Fields Of Medicine + Oncology

      Aug 31, 2018

      People diagnosed with cancer and their families often use therapies such as acupuncture, exercise, diet and meditation to cope with the physical, emotional, and spiritual effects of the cancer, and in search of relief from symptoms that their convent

      5 min read

    • Article

      Opinion: Prejudice And Patient Choice: An Insidious Confluence In Medicine

      May 23, 2019

      Minority physicians like me often hear patients say things like, "I don't want your kind taking care of me!" That kind of racism has no place in health care.

      4 min read

    • Article

      Ryan Prior

      Dec 16, 2022

      Q _ As a teen, you suffered through a debilitating “invisible” illness that eluded diagnosis for months. What is the most validating thing a doctor can do for a patient in that situation? A _Three simple words, “I believe you.” As Sir William Osler,

      3 min read

    • Article

      Whathappenedto ‘Donoharm’?

      Nov 24, 2019

      I t’s confusing for a lot of people knowing that your doctors have signed up to a medical code of conduct—proposed 2,500 years ago by the Greek doctor and philosopher Hippocrates—that undertakes they must “First, do no harm.” Yet we also know that pr

      3 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for The Healing Touch

    5/5

    1 rating0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      The Healing Touch - David L. Cram

      Plato

      1

      The Influence of Bedside Manner

      The concept of bedside manner dates back 2,500 years, when Plato wrote the earliest known description of the doctor-patient relationship in The Laws. Plato writes that the best clinical medicine is practiced when the doctor and the patient have concluded a fully human relationship in which the technical aspects of care are placed in the human context (Siegler 1993). However, throughout much of history, doctors would not always fully inform patients of their conditions. This code of silence still exists today in some cultures. For example, a physician might not inform a cancer patient of his or her condition, believing that not knowing will enhance the patient’s immunity, decrease anxiety and therefore extend life.

      Fortunately, in the United States today, medical professionals recognize patients’ need to know and understand their conditions. We realize that, especially with a serious or chronic disease, patients are vulnerable. What doctors say and how they act toward these patients can have a major effect on both the patients and their diseases. The will to get better and to remain upbeat irrespective of the illness can be a direct result of a sympathetic physician playing a significant role in the patient’s life. S.H. Kaplan (1989) states, The physician-patient relationship is a primary bond that may act as a social support to influence the patient’s health status.

      Good physicians realize that patients expect answers from their doctors. The manner in which a physician talks to the patient can affect the long-range outlook of the disease. Incorrectly done, it can result in such undesirable effects as noncompliance with therapy, more complicated testing, the need for higher doses of medication, more frequent office visits, longer hospital stays, or an increase in medical lawsuits. The patient may also decide to seek another doctor. If the goal of our society is to achieve better health care at reduced costs, a good bedside manner from health care providers obviously will play a significant role in reducing these costs.

      Qualities of a good doctor

      I believe the following are the qualities of a good doctor and the foundation of a good bedside manner:

      Intelligence

      Altruism

      Honesty

      Inquisitive mind

      Sense of humor

      Empathy

      Self-confidence

      Patience

      Sincerity

      Good memory

      Compassion.

      Genuine concern for the welfare of others

      How is bedside manner best applied?

      To have medical knowledge and skill alone is not enough. To be truly effective in treating the sick, doctors and nurses must have good communication skills. In one sense, they are educators. Education helps patients make decisions. Doctors should allow patients to make shared decisions and be willing to walk the road to recovery with them (Herman

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1