Inside The Physician Mind

Dr. Joseph Bujak provides an insider's perspective on the beliefs and behaviors of physicians. His insight will prompt you to question your assumptions and break through the barriers that may be keeping you from forming productive relationships with the physicians in your organization. He also provides suggestions for using your new understanding to influence physician behavior and promote enduring partnerships. With candor and wit, Dr. Bujak shares the wisdom he has developed through his years of experience as both a physician and an administrator: A physician's sense of time is very different from that of an administrator Being chief of staff is the equivalent of drawing the short straw A physician's definition of teamwork is like the game of golf Traditional medical staff organization is not the vehicle for developing relationships with physicians A good role model for influencing physician behavior is the old TV character Columbo You should approach change using the metaphor of moving a Slinky Generation-X physicians differ greatly from traditionalist, or baby boomer, physicians; propositions acceptable to Generation-X physicians will be rejected by the others, and vice versa

By inviting the Dalai Lama and leading researchers in medicine, psychology, and neuroscience to join in conversation, the Mind & Life Institute set the stage for a fascinating exploration of the healing potential of the human mind. The Mind’s Own Physician presents in its entirety the thirteenth Mind and Life dialogue, a discussion addressing a range of vital questions concerning the science and clinical applications of meditation: How do meditative practices influence pain and human suffering? What role does the brain play in emotional well-being and health? To what extent can our minds actually influence physical disease? Are there important synergies here for transforming health care, and for understanding our own evolutionary limitations as a species? Edited by world-renowned researchers Jon Kabat-Zinn and Richard J. Davidson, this book presents this remarkably dynamic interchange along with intriguing research findings that shed light on the nature of the mind, its capacity to refine itself through training, and its role in physical and emotional health.

Are physicians a mystery? To many of us, yes. Physicians perform one of the most valuable personal services in the world. They care for our bodies in the most intimate of ways. We place our lives in their hands and trust they have our best interest at heart. But how much do we really know of physicians and their inner world? Relatively little. The environment for practicing medicine has changed dramatically over the past few decades. The commoditizing of physicians and their work frequently causes a dehumanization of the doctor and the doctor/patient relationship not to mention the connections between physicians and other staff. Due to the training, practice culture, constraints, liabilities, and pressures placed on physicians today, they often cannot practice the kind of personalized, relationship-enhancing medicine that would benefit both patient and caregiver. In this monograph Dr. Herdley Paolini does a great service by opening the inner world of physicians and helping us understand them, how to relate to them, and how to best support them in their critical role in healthcare. Her insights will be of great value to everyone from hospital administrators and clinical staff, to insurance providers, government agencies, and anyone who interacts with physicians. The Florida Hospital Healthcare & Leadership Monograph Series is an innovative teaching and learning tool from the largest admitting hospital in America. Monographs in this series provide focused, relevant training to individuals and organizations on a wide variety of healthcare and leadership topics.Ideal for healthcare professionals, leadership innovators, researchers, teachers, students, and other pioneering professionals each volume provides the latest information and break-through thinking on the subject in a clear, concise, readable form.

Steven E. Hodes, M.D., initially trained in traditional, high-caliber medical programs that led him through graduation at the Albert Einstein Medical School and to a fellowship at Mount Sinai Hospital. But many years later, he saw something vital missing in his approach to healthcare. I was trained as a physician, not a healer...taught to view the patient as a machine suffering from some mechanical failure. My purpose was to be the best diagnostician possible, he explains. Then events occurred that opened the eyes of this now veteran physician to deep insights about the mind-body-spirit connection. That awakening moved him to a metaphysical view of health—a view more spiritual than religious, but still firmly grounded in science. Embracing his role as a metaphysician, he also began to see himself as a meta-physician, or doctor transformed (meta) by this new awareness. In this book, Hodes describes his journey to becoming a metaphysician on call. He points out profound, yet simple, observations and beliefs that affect our perception of the nature of reality—metaphysics—which, in turn, can largely affect our well-being in all senses—body, mind, and spirit. We all can and should take responsibility for our own well-being on all levels, he explains. This book is designed to inspire us to ask our own questions, and gather our own evidence to enhance all areas of our lives and well-being, and so find healing and peace.

On average, a physician will interrupt a patient describing her symptoms within eighteen seconds. In that short time, many doctors decide on the likely diagnosis and best treatment. Often, decisions made this way are correct, but at crucial moments they can also be wrong—with catastrophic consequences. In this myth-shattering book, Jerome Groopman pinpoints the forces and thought processes behind the decisions doctors make. Groopman explores why doctors err and shows when and how they can—with our help—avoid snap judgments, embrace uncertainty, communicate effectively, and deploy other skills that can profoundly impact our health. This book is the first to describe in detail the warning signs of erroneous medical thinking and reveal how new technologies may actually hinder accurate diagnoses. How Doctors Think offers direct, intelligent questions patients can ask their doctors to help them get back on track. Groopman draws on a wealth of research, extensive interviews with some of the country’s best doctors, and his own experiences as a doctor and as a patient. He has learned many of the lessons in this book the hard way, from his own mistakes and from errors his doctors made in treating his own debilitating medical problems. How Doctors Think reveals a profound new view of twenty-first-century medical practice, giving doctors and patients the vital information they need to make better judgments together.

In this final volume of his best-selling 'Inner' trilogy, Roger Neighbour explores the relationship between a doctor's professional and private selves. He suggests that the mind of every doctor retains an untrained 'ordinary human being' part - their Inner Physician - which makes an important, though often neglected, contribution to medical practice. This 'Inner Physician', which he also describes as the 'amateur within' or the 'expert minus the expertise', plays a major role in diagnosis and treatment, and is the chief source of insight, empathy and clinical acumen. Roger shows that skilled use of the Inner Physician is one thing that distinguishes the generalist from the specialist.

By inviting the Dalai Lama and leading researchers in medicine, psychology, and neuroscience to join in conversation, the Mind & Life Institute set the stage for a fascinating exploration of the healing potential of the human mind. The Mind’s Own Physician presents in its entirety the thirteenth Mind and Life dialogue, a discussion addressing a range of vital questions concerning the science and clinical applications of meditation: How do meditative practices influence pain and human suffering? What role does the brain play in emotional well-being and health? To what extent can our minds actually influence physical disease? Are there important synergies here for transforming health care, and for understanding our own evolutionary limitations as a species? Edited by world-renowned researchers Jon Kabat-Zinn and Richard J. Davidson, this book presents this remarkably dynamic interchange along with intriguing research findings that shed light on the nature of the mind, its capacity to refine itself through training, and its role in physical and emotional health.