L1: Intro & Dr/Pt Relationship I

Question 1

Define health

Answer 1

• Health is not absence of disease, but process by which individuals maintain: a.) sense of life comprehensible, manageable and meaningful - Ability to function in face of changes within themselves and their relationship with their environment

Question 2

What is the key to a your reactions when dealing with a pt?

Answer 2

• The goal is NOT “no emotional reactivity”. Do not shut off emotions. Monitor expression of emotions and be aware, recognize and analyze in order to use the information provided by the patient to better understand them and facilitate treatment.

Question 3

Identify strategies that will help increase amount of happiness experience in life:

Answer 3

• Work/leisure experiences - Finding meaning/purpose - Having relationships - Physical health - Community service/helping others

Question 4

Describe empathy and its role in the doctor-patient relationship.

Answer 4

• Empathy is a means to understand the subjective world and experience of another person. - Effective practice of medicine hinges on connecting the subjective experience of patients with the evaluation of the objective data set before the physician - To relate empathetically, doctors must be well grounded to something other than the patient.

Question 5

What is the difference between disease and illness?

Answer 5

• Disease is a disruption in normal biological function, is objective and has a focus on curing - Illness is a sense of dis-ease, is subjective (feeling sick) and reflected in mood, affect and behavior; focus here is on healing

Question 6

Describe how gratitude helps build resiliency. How can it be boosted?

Answer 6

• Studies have indicated that gratitude is linked to better sleep, decreased anxiety/depression, increased positive emotions optimisim coping skills creativity and interpersonal skills, decreased pain and fatigue - To boost gratitude, create a gratitude journal, perform acts of altruism and kindness, learn to forgive, invest time/energy in friends and family, take care of body, develop strategies for coping with stress and hardships

Question 7

Define behavioral medicine and its contribution to practice of medicine.

Answer 7

• interdisciplinary field concerned with development and integration of behavioral, psychosocial and biomedical science knowledge/techniques relevant to understanding health and illness and application of this to prevention, diagnosis, treatment and rehab

Question 8

What are the reaction types that are seen in the patient and physician during a clinical encounter?

Answer 8

• Transference: refers to reactions the pt has to the clinician - Countertransference: refers to reactions the clinician has to the pt

Question 9

How does one become grounded?

Answer 9

• Demonstrate commitment to quality care - Be trustworthy and communicate timely - Perform heart-centered listening and truth-telling - Have a lack of denial - Be proactive and perform ongoing decision-making

Question 10

What is cultural humility? What are the basic tenets?

Answer 10

• Defined as an ability to maintain an interpersonal stance that is open to other people and in relation to aspects of cultural identity that are important to other people. - Tenets: lifelong process of self-reflection, self critique; is not mastery of different beliefs/practices; requires developing respectful partnerships with pts through: patient-focused interviewing; exploring similarities / differences bw one’s own and patient’s priorities, goals and capacities and appreciation for different worldviews hewn from lived experience