The physician's creed: Do you feel that physicians follow this all the time or not?
143144
Are you referring to the Oath of Hippocrates?\n\nWhich one? The classical\nI swear by Apollo Physician and Asclepius and Hygieia and Panaceia and all the gods and goddesses\nhttp://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/doctors/oath_classical.html\n\nor the Modern?\nI swear to fulfill, to the best of my ability and judgment, this covenant\nhttp://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/doctors/oath_modern.html\n\nAs you can see they are quite different. The ancient one says something like "I will not raise my knife"...if I followed that I'd be out of a job.\n\nI feel most physicians do follow the modern version. Most are professionals with high standards, and adhere to the rules and laws of the profession, and treat patients in an ethical manner. We are however, human beings, who see bad things frequently. Then there are some patients who treat the hospital and doctors as though it's a Burger King drive through. Many don't want to do what they are advised to do. People smoke, do drugs, have unprotected sex, drive drunk...then get angry because I don't have a magic pill to make things all better. \n\nAs for "making the most money off of you" comment...maybe you should find someone who works in medical billing. You'll find that alot of people don't pay their medical bills, or that reimbursement from insurance companies or the government are less than what was billed, if it arrives at all. Medical School costs $100,000+ (with loan interest it can be alot more), malpractice insurance in some specialties is $85,000 per year, not to mention other costs of running a practice. A small fraction of doctors go into medicine for the money. Just my opinion.
1110432
I think a lot of people believe what they say so strongly that they think they're saying what they believe, when really they're saying what others believe and what they in turn have internalized, for lack of a better word.  But I do agree with the answerer who said that all knowledge is based on authority; it's impossible to avoid that completely.  We are immensely affected by what we're born in to.  There's no getting around that.  I read a book last year (The Immoralist, by André Gide) that dealt with that concept a bit, and the author believed it necessary to completely kill oneself (not physically, of course) to find the blank parchment underneath; the original part of oneself that hadn't been tainted by society and family, and the one that could still be imprinted with truly personal and genuine beliefs.\n\nThat's a utopian ideal, at best.  To expect people to shed all that they know in the hopes of embracing something completely foreign, which may supposedly be more real and appropriate for them is really excessive.  Even if people wanted to do that, it's still an enormous task to undertake.  So to some extent, everybody repeats a lot of hearsay, if you will, in the guise of true, personal beliefs.  Some people are more "sheltered" than others and less aware of the extent to which their beliefs have been swayed and shaped by others, and some people have broken out of their molds in a manner that would have made Gide himself proud.\n\nPersonally, I think I say what I believe a good amount of the time.  I still struggle with a lot that I've learned growing up; things that I see still influencing my life even after I've chosen other paths.  An unavoidable fact of life, I suppose.  But I have learned to look outside of the box I was born in to, and also to step outside that box and look at it from a different perspective.  That helps a lot.
258264
I concur.  I feel like adherence to a prescribed moral principle removes personal responsibility.  I've felt that way (only perhaps less eloquent!) since I was eight.  If you are a good person because you adhere to the Bible / church values unquestioningly, you aren't actually a good person.  You are only truly good if you are the person choosing your own behavior.  I think fundamentally it boils down to manners - in greater or lesser dimensions.
858011
The teaching in medical school is hardly "basic" as your comment stated. Medicine is such a vast field that it is impossible to teach medical students everything they need to know. That's why they have to do residency for more training in their specialty be it pediatrics or surgery. The business side of medicine is learned through experience and talking to mentors, associates, & colleagues. Knowing which test to order & what medicine to prescibe is an integral part of their training. However, physicians are often second guessed by patients who often want more (expensive) testing or drugs that they do not need. If I only have a dollar for everytime a patient has told me "my (place relative or acquaintance here) had the exact same thing, and it turned out that he/she had (place extremely rare condition here)..."
871660
If you are talking about an innate knowledge of doing right and wrong the answer is that not everyone does.  Certain mental illness lack the characteristic, people with damaged brain function because of an injury etc.  Perhaps you need do define "conscience."
1015975
The expression is not, as widely believed, part of the Hippocratic oath, nor is it exactly a direct quote from Hippocrates. A more exact quote may be, "Declare the past, diagnose the present, foretell the future; practice these acts. As to diseases, make a habit of two things — to help, or at least to do no harm." The idea is that a doctor should be sure that whatever he is doing for a patient doesn't make things worse. Sensible advice.
254225
I felt the same way after my first year.  It truly shows you how little you know and that the learning process continues forever.  Residency is a time to learn your limits, gain exposure to as much as possible, and carry that experience forward into practice.\n\nFor me, after I got over the pain of my first two years, the overall experience is one that I would do over and over again.  Greatest time of my life - even the first two years.\n\nJust knowing that you can improve, being humbled by the amount to learn as well as the privilige to care for other people means you are one of the good ones.\n\nAs far as keeping with it - the rewards of medicine are not monetary, nor do they relate to power or standing of any sort. If you seek these things - you wont be satisfied.  the owrk you do has to be the reward.  If you don't think that is the case - do something else.  I am certain you can.  Doctors are the brightest and best - not just in medicine - I beleive any god doc can put the same intensity and effort into any pursuit and achieve greatness.  Don't forget that.\n\nAs one of my mentors said "Have some respect for self for God's sake.  You're a surgeon!"\n\nWhen you are done with residency, ask me about practice.
1024235
It's just a question of the Hippocratic oath.  "First Do No Wrong"  Would you want to be stuck with a dirty needle at any time?  I hope you never have to find out.  Dying this way is very sad and not something to make fun of.
686295
yuor doctors obligation is to tell patients the nature of whatever you're suffering from.if it has anything to do with any life tthreatenig illness,the cia will be all over it.
779309
If your mind is not set on doing medicine than please dont do it(here instead of heart  I have used mind because to study you need mind & not the heart).The motive of this profession is to save people's life and if you r not completely in it than you cannot do justice to your practice(i.e.not work a doctor never works).
1036649
yourself. But do you always trust yourself to do what is right?
577507
As a moderator for several years of a health-related group, I found that a lot of people complained that their doctors were too rushed to answer their questions thoroughly, or worse yet just kind of pass them off. Many people have many more questions than they feel they can comfortably ask at a single doctor visit, and for many subsequent visits only bring up more questions. With the medical system the way it is today, doctors are rushed, and patients know it. Many times people feel guilty or uncomfortable trying to push for an answer. And there are a lot of doctors out there, whether they mean to be or not, who come across to some of their patients as unapproachable when it comes to asking questions.\n\nIn regards to dosing issues, many times drugs are used "off label" - prescribed for something other than it is approved for (for example, currently autoimmune chronic hives are being treated by some doctors with cyclosporine, an anti-rejection med used in transplant patients), or they are prescribed at higher doses (again, with chronic hives most hivers are prescribed double the usual daily dose of antihistamines, if not more). When people are given a prescription like this, it's natural to seek reassurance that this is the norm and ok, even though it was ordered by their doctors. \n\nI hope that most people who are asking health related questions are taking the information they gain from this site and use that information for further research on the internet, to confirm the information, or to give them ideas of what else to possibly look for....  And also they are hopefully using any info they get here to construct questions to ask their doctors, or to make sensible decisions with their doctors....\n\n(added May 29th) Forgot mention - Another thing I've seen a lot of as a moderator is that there are surprisingly quite a few doctors out there, even specialists, who don't know as much as one would expect. For example, with the chronic hives, there are still doctors out there who insist on doing allergy testing, even though there is plenty of documentation in the medical literature that such testing is not only a waste of time/money (very high incidence of false positive results in chronic hivers), but can be dangerous for quite a few hivers, resulting in anaphylaxis. And we also constantly see people whose doctors only have them on minimal medication, when again there is more than ample documentation that chronic hives usually requires a cocktail of meds often at higher-than-label dosing. So I can definitely understand why people are turning to fellow patients for more information.
71975
Yes, some are.  The problem is that many of them try to practice outside of their profession or abuse their skills.  I work in the medical field and I have a lot of athletes who see chiropractors.  Some want to snap, crack, and pop everything.  Some want to pretend they can treat flu, colds, ear infections, skin disorders and sports medicine related injuries.  Then you have the small majority who just want to do their job.  They serve a purpose, it's just hard to find one that does their job well and understands their role in the medical field.  This is partially because insurance companies don't reimburse for chiropractic care.  They have to get their money from somewhere.
638385
Several of my friends did this a few years ago.  they carried little cards around with them and wrote things down, and were very absorbed in it.  I had one major problem with the course, as an observer. It seemed to cause them to think in a non-compassionate way about their friends.  If someone was sick, they said that the person had invited illness into their lives.  If someone had cancer, that too was something their friends had invited in.  I found it hard to take this philosophy.  It left no room for the random things that occur in people's lives.  Everything was created by the person.  Nothing just happened.
610424
Any one or more of the following:\n\n1 ) Sympathy\n~ True physicians tend to have empathic and sympathetic bonds with their patients and some of their patients' ailments may 'rub off' on them.\n\n2 ) Patient Load\n~ Internal complications, such as licensing, permits, insurance, and other overheads, have increased greatly over the years, meaning that a doctor can no longer spend as much time as they would like with any one patient.\n\n3 ) Off Days\n~ Everyone has off days, when they're not as cheerful and sunny as they normally are.  Though with a stressful profession such as doctors, it tends to happen more often than elsewhere.  Every doctor knows that even the slightest mistake can cost a patient their life; that's a LOT of stress!
1084952
all the Hippocratic Oath is is a promise that the doctor will always try to save the patients life - nothing greek!
608896
I do not believe in conventional wisdom. I personally believe that it only increases the chances for people to do what ever is being questioned. I stick to one of the mottos of the Perkins School for the Blind near my town, "Let the child interact with the scissors, so he may cut himself and learn that they are sharp"