Patient Doctor Relationship – The Doctor’s Touch

• 17 Mar 2021 09:51:49 AM
• |General Urology

Dear All,

This talk by Abraham Varghese is an eye opener for many of us who call ourselves Doctors.

https://www.ted.com/talks/abraham_verghese_a_doctor_s_touch?language=en#t-425116

All the new gadgets we use are no substitution for good and detailed History Taking and Subsequent Physical Examination. Today with innumerable Lab tests and proliferation of Radiological Evaluations, the place for the former two, have slowly being relegated to history. We are untruthful when we say we still depend on History Taking and Clinical Examination. The patients visiting the OPD often come with all the possible evaluations and we straight away proceed to seeing them than taking history and clinical examination. Quite often the patient goes a step further and provides you with Dr. Google’s diagnosis and recommendations and we fall a pray for it and proceed from there leaving the patient devoid of what he needs.

This is modern medicine and we are hypocrites when we say History taking and clinical exam is a necessity.

God bless all doctors of the present and future. Let sense prevail and let us return to the basics of taking proper history of the patient along with detailed clinical examination. Let us resurrect these at the earliest for the good of mankind.

With warm regards,

Venu

Comments(1)

• 

  Venugopal P

  17 Mar 2021 10:04:34 AM

  Dear All,

  I find that the talk opens midway. Please scroll back and begin at the beginning. The initial part is worth listening.

  I would like all of us to ponder and honestly answer as how many of us still believe in the art of History taking and Clinical Examination prior to viewing the Lab and radiological evaluations the patient has brought along with him. Do we still believe in these so called ‘Old fashioned’ methods.

  Venu