Practicing patient-centred care brings many benefits for the patient. It enables them to be heard and their ideas, concerns, and expectations addressed. For the doctor it is less clear. Registrars sometimes tell me they feel they ‘have given in to the patient’, or ‘the consultation didn't achieve what they had hoped.’ Of course with experience we realise that a consultation needs to involve negotiation if we are to connect with the patient and reach agreement. We also realise that things often take more than one consultation and following patients is a real strength of our general practice. If, during a consultation, we achieve a new understanding which empowers the patient, we all feel satisfied. Furthermore, when that great consultation happens I suspect we all know we have connected on a deeper level with emotions and maybe even in a spiritual dimension. This is my great reward as a doctor.
Watching newly qualified doctors early in their training I don't feel many achieve that ‘great consultation’. This is mainly because they need to make sure that they are not missing serious treatable physical illness. They rely on using questions and answers to work …