Professionalism

DocCom Module 3: Therapeutic Aspects of Medical Encounters

Clinician patient encounters are therapeutic in and of themselves, independently of diagnostic and therapeutic activities of proven effectiveness. This module identifies the therapeutic elements of clinical encounters, so the learner can be intentional about maximizing these elements with patients. These…

Managing Physician Stress, Preventing Burnout

Physicians are under more stress than ever before, much of it due to factors beyond their control. Laurie Drill-Mellum, an emergency medicine physician describes the forces bearing down on physicians, including litigation stress, and presents techniques for actively managing the…

Physician Health and Quality of Care: Who Heals the Healer?

Recent large-scale surveys of physicians show high numbers of respondents endorsing statements of stress and burnout. This video presentation by an emergency medicine physician examines the quantifiable effects of physician stress on the physician’s physiology and on the patient’s quality…

Email Between Physician and Patient

Communicating with patients by e-mail is rapidly becoming a part of many physicians’ medical practice. It ranks high in patient satisfaction, and at least one study found it to be associated with better patient compliance and better control of chronic…

Surgical Readmissions: What Surgeons Can and Can’t Do About Them

CMS’s Hospital Readmission Reduction Program, previously targeting medical diagnoses, is expanding its reach to surgical procedures, starting with knee and hip replacements in 2015. This monograph will review new peer-reviewed studies about the reasons for surgical readmissions, to what extent…