The Emancipation of the Patient
One consequence of a more realistic appreciation of the uncertainties surrounding diagnosis and management is that we expect our doctors to function as expert sounding-boards – we want information, options, pros and cons; but ultimately we want to make the decisions. This is threatening to medics trained in the culture of doctor-knows-best. And, as Tallis argues, there are other, more intractable issues. Publicly funded healthcare is a competitive economy: one patient’s involved and informed discussion with their doctor could have been a series of more didactic, cursory consultations for several others. The government also expects doctors to act as gatekeepers, accessing resource-consuming tests and treatments according to medical judgment, not patient preference underscored by the threat of litigation. The degree to which patients should be able to dictate their medical care is a political nettle that has yet to be grasped.
Phil Whitaker’s essay disguised as bookreview, in The Guardian
[x]#861 fan zaterdag 30 oktober 2004 @ 16:23:16
