There's a reason why the number one complaint by patients about their doctors is not that they don't know what they're talking about. Rather the biggest complaint is that their doctor isn't treating them like a person. They barely spend time with the patient; they just don't get to know him/her; the doctors' abrupt manners affect their patients.
My thinking is that over the past 60 years, medical education has evolved in its ability to pass vast amounts of scientific knowledge to the learners which, unfortunately, has moved hours from the bedside to hours in a lecture hall. This lack of bedside hours equals directly into lack of communication skills with patients. And that's what doctors do. Anybody can make the diagnoses doctors can make as long as they learn the language which is vast. So the doctors have to take the knowledge they hear/see/feel and convert it into English. While I do think it's important to be able to build the knowledge base so that everything you hear/see/feel means something to you, I don't think one should neglect the ability to talk to the patient. After all, if you know everything wrong with a person you see, what's the good of not being able to inform them?
Our Dean recognizes this and is willing to stumble along in trying to find a solution. I'm just sad that I'll be missing out on his changes.
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