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Two Viewpoints: New Physicians For a New Century & Improving the Health of the Public Requires Changes In Medical Education  

Richard Cooper and Alfred Tauber/Antal Solyom. 

Academic Medicine
December 2005, Vol. 80, Issue #12, pg. 1086-1093.

Review by: Linda Heun, Ph.D. <lheun@aacom.org>

First, Cooper and Tauber assert that medical education must be radically restructured to place facts and skills within a context of ethics and values along five general lines:

  • assertion of medical ethics as the foundation of clinical medicine
  • recognition of central place of values in clinical decision making
  • cultivation of the ethos of humane care
  • selection of medical students with both cognitive skills and empathy
  • support of faculty who can 'teach' the above

In the second viewpoint piece Solyon 'connects the dots' between the ways physicians are educated about civic responsibility, leadership and integrity and the current unequal access to healthcare in the U.S. He suggests that it is unlikely that the health care system will convert to a humanistic, patient-centered approach; thus, requiring that medical education take the responsibility to prepare physicians to take the moral and professional lead in ensuring that high quality health care is provided to everyone.

For more information about this article and author(s), visit the Academic Medicine website.

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