Principles of Clinical Practice: An Introductory Textbook

✍ Scribed by Michael L. Parchman (auth.), Mark B. Mengel M.D., M.P.H. (eds.)

• Publisher: Springer US
• Year: 1991
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 423
• Edition: 1
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

As we move into the 21st century it is becoming increasingly difficult to offer appropriate introductory clinical experiences for medical students. Many schools offer clinical experiences in the first year of medical school, when the learner has little background in the traditions and origins of the doctor-patient interaction. Others begin this process in the second year, after a professional language base has been established, but concise educational materials are scarce that integrate the meaning of the privileged clinical encounter with the process and content of interviewing and examining patients. In the tertiary hospitals, where most medical schools are based, the educators must provide an orienta­ tion to the clinical encounter, an intensely personal experience, in the midst of glittering technological marvels that easily distract both the novice physician and the wizened teacher. Understanding the context and historical basis for the privilege of interviewing and examining another person about intimate matters relating to health and disease is essential to this process. Considering these factors, this textbook is written to assist medical educators and medical students involved in early clinical training. As the demand for "high-tech" medicine has accelerated, so has the public concern over the loss of "high-touch" or compassionate, humane interactions with physicians. Physicians are perceived as more concerned with readouts from machines and fiberoptic views of the patient than with understanding and car­ ing about the people we have labeled as patients.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter....Pages i-xxiii
Front Matter....Pages 1-1
A Historical Overview of Patient Care....Pages 3-19
Philosophical and Ethical Foundations of the Physician-Patient Relationship....Pages 21-44
Front Matter....Pages 45-45
Interviewing and History Taking....Pages 47-77
The Physical Examination....Pages 79-98
Clinical Decision Making....Pages 99-123
Clinical Management....Pages 125-153
Health Maintenance....Pages 155-181
Front Matter....Pages 183-183
The Doctor—Patient Relationship....Pages 185-204
The Family System....Pages 205-235
The Cultural World of the Patient....Pages 237-265
The Health Care System....Pages 267-296
Front Matter....Pages 297-297
Medical Ethics....Pages 299-316
Medical Malpractice....Pages 317-336
Medical Economics....Pages 337-359
Front Matter....Pages 361-361
Patient-Centered Care....Pages 363-391
Back Matter....Pages 393-418

✦ Subjects

Internal Medicine; General Practice / Family Medicine; Pediatrics; Public Health; Epidemiology; Medicine/Public Health, general