Bringing Doctor-Patient Medical Decision-Making into Focus

When I finally got eye glasses as a teenager, after denying the need for far too long, I was repeatedly surprised by the world that everyone else had been seeing all along. Leaves on the trees, graffiti by the highway—I was astonished, amazed, and suddenly informed. It is easy to assume we are seein...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Stark, Meredith (Author)
Format: Electronic Review
Language:English
Check availability: HBZ Gateway
Interlibrary Loan:Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany)
Published: 2014
In: The Hastings Center report
Year: 2014, Volume: 44, Issue: 4, Pages: 44-45
Further subjects:B Book review
Online Access: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
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Summary:When I finally got eye glasses as a teenager, after denying the need for far too long, I was repeatedly surprised by the world that everyone else had been seeing all along. Leaves on the trees, graffiti by the highway—I was astonished, amazed, and suddenly informed. It is easy to assume we are seeing all we need to see, knowing all we need to know, until something jars us from this false comfort and compels us to reconsider. So it is with thinking about the current state of doctor-patient decisions. The unfocused view has physicians listening to patients and clearly communicating information about illnesses and treatment options, patients making good use of high-quality data to craft sound decisions, and doctors joining patient preference with provider beneficence to optimize decisions. The reassuring outlook finds physician paternalism defeated, patients empowered, and all right with the world. Peter Ubel cannot let that fiction stand. In Critical Decisions: How You and Your Doctor Can Make the Right Medical Choices Together, Ubel reminds us that our work in actualizing patient autonomy and fostering patient participation in critical health decisions remains far from over.
ISSN:1552-146X
Contains:Enthalten in: Hastings Center, The Hastings Center report
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1002/hast.331