Education and counselling as components of care in person-centered medicine

Abstract

Two of the core components of the duties of physicians as doctors is to educate those who seek their professional services as patients and to counsel them so that they are able to improve and sustain their wellbeing [1]. This can only be fully achieved within a professional relationship of service to an individual patient, as a person when the physician recognises as a person and where the clinical relationship is based on trust [2]. Confidence in such a relationship grows from the knowledge and skills that the physician is able to apply within a trusted ethical framework. Following the Hippocratic tradition, the World Medical Association re-established physicians' ethical 'contract' with individuals and communities after World War II with its Declaration of Geneva and its subsequent associated Statements [3,4]. The duty of care to the individual with respect for the autonomy of each patient is central.