Qualities of a good psychiatrist

Abstract

AbstractIntroduction: There is limited published work regarding the qualities of a good psychiatrist in Asia. With greater attention paid to psychiatry training in Singapore as a result of the Ministry of Health's National Mental Health Blueprint, there is a need to assess the qualities of a good psychiatrist to guide training.Methods: The present study consisted of two steps. First, a focus group of six senior psychiatrists was conducted to obtain a list of positive qualities of a psychiatrist. Second, an anonymous survey was sent to all psychiatry trainees and psychiatrists in Singapore to assess the relative importance of 40 qualities that were chosen from the list of qualities obtained from the focus group. Factor analysis was performed to elucidate the themes from the qualities and Friedman's χ2 test was used to compare the ratings between themes.Results: The response rate was 48.7% (74 of 152). Analysis showed four themes among the qualities assessed: “personal values”, “professional”, “relationship”, “academic‐executive”. The highly ranked themes for a good psychiatrist were personal values and professional qualities. Lowly ranked themes were relationship and academic‐executive.Discussion: A good psychiatrist in Singapore is narrowly defined by personal values and professional qualities. Training should correctly be focused on clinical skills. There may be a place to give more emphasis to qualities within the themes of relationship and academic‐executive, which are related to the all‐round development of a psychiatrist.