%0 Journal Article
%T Good physicians from the perspective of their patients
%A Ami Schattner
%A Dan Rudin
%A Navah Jellin
%J BMC Health Services Research
%D 2004
%I BioMed Central
%R 10.1186/1472-6963-4-26
%X Patients hospitalized or attending clinics at a large teaching hospital selected the 4 attributes that they considered most important out of 21 listed arbitrarily in a questionnaire. The questionnaire included 7 items each in the domains of patient autonomy, professional expertise and humanism.Participating patients (n = 445, mean age 57.5 ¡À 16 years) selected professional expertise (50%), physician's patience and attentiveness (38% and 30%, respectively), and informing the patient, representing the patient's interests, being truthful and respecting patient's preferences (25¨C36% each) as the most essential attributes. Patient's selections were not significantly influenced by different demographic or clinical background. Selections of attributes in the domain of patient's autonomy were significantly more frequent and this was the preferred domain for 31% and as important as another domain for 16% ¨C significantly more than the domain of professional expertise (P = 0.008), and much more than the domain of humanism and support (P < 0.0005).Patients studied want their physicians to be highly professional and expert clinicians and show humaneness and support, but their first priority is for the physician to respect their autonomy.An expert clinician whose choices are evidence-based; sensitive and dedicated to the patient ¨C not just disease-oriented; who heeds and respects the patient's autonomy, striving at conveying all relevant information to the patient to enable a truly shared decision-making. That can be seen as a prototype or role model of a first class physician. However, these laudable qualities, discussed in many texts [1-3], were purely conceived by physicians, for physicians. How do patients value these different physicians' qualities? What would their priorities be? This unique point of view, little discussed in previous studies, is the subject of our current research.Patients hospitalized at our 600-bed teaching medical center or attending one of its day clin
%U http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6963/4/26