Medical professionalism: a GP's perspective

A really good liver

I remember when I was a medical student the excitement of going round the wards with a keen doctor who would take us to feel a "really good spleen" or listen to an "interesting cardiac murmur".
Like my fellow students in our new, pristine white coats, I was very excited. However, something in me rebelled and a little voice said, "This isn't quite right".
It was not that we did not greet the patient, ask permission to examine and do all that medical etiquette and politeness required. I felt uneasy and could not articulate why.
One day my group was invited by the professor to examine a "really good liver".
We all trotted behind him, got to the patient's bedside and I recognised her distinctive face immediately.
I thought, "This isn't a liver, she's a person - my old teacher".
She had taught me in primary school. It is a lesson that remained with me throughout the rest of medical school and my practice of medicine. Patients have to be seen in their entirety and not as fragmented parts.

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download intervention: pdf Aghadiuno_en.pdf

download presentation PowerPoint: pdf Aghadiuno pp.pdf