From the ArcaMax Publishing, Health & Fitness Newsletter:
http://www.arcamax.com/news/healthtips/s-302064-470444
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (UPI) -- Informed patients, often with high
expectations, are causing doctors to adjust their bedside manner, a
U.S. study found.
The study, published in Clinical Orthopaedics and Related Research,
found changes in society and technology have resulted in patients who
expect to be listened to and who want to be fully involved in clinical
decision-making.
Education, affluence, information sources -- including the Internet --
direct-to-consumer marketing result in patients not merely requesting
care but requesting a particular operation or even a particular
implant. Patients no longer show their doctors absolute and
unquestionable respect.
"Patients have come to expect miracles in medicine as the norm, yet
these miracles are not without inherent risk," study author Dr.
Bohannon Mason of the Orthocarolina Hip and Knee Center in Charlotte,
N.C,, said in a statement.
However, Mason cautioned patients might not necessarily be motivated
by evidence-based medicine and may be willing to adopt the promises of
direct-to-consumer marketing.
Doctors need to, in Mason's view, "maintain control of validated
information sources and of the exchange of information with the
patient" as they serve "as the interpreters and balancers of
scientific information to help guide patients through the maze of
medical hyperbole."