Abstract
Learning new facts is not the only, or even necessarily the most important, aspect of becoming a good doctor. In the first 1.5 years of medical school, referred to as the pre-clinical years, attention is necessarily focused on having students progress from not knowing foundational concepts in physiology and pathophysiology to knowing and proving that they know by answering exam questions that test their factual cognitive understanding. Further medical education is then an ongoing process of learning how to apply what is known, that is, “the facts,” to the complex needs of ill human beings. To practice clinical medicine is to acknowledge that knowing facts is not enough and that to help actual patients requires wisdom and judgment in how to best apply what is already known.
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Liben, S. (2020). Mindful Medical Practice and the Good Doctor. In: MD Aware. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22430-1_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22430-1_11
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