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      Anonymous
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      On a flight to the USA I came across an article in a newspaper about how the doctors generally interact with patients in the UK. I thought this was very relevant to all doctors every where and therefore thought I must post a summary of what I read.

      Sir Anthony Seldon, the outgoing master of Wellington College, will become the vice-chancellor of the University of Buckingham UK from September this year. Speaking to Sian Griffiths of Sunday Times he said he was going to shake up medicine by teaching students of his university “mindfullness”. In the past few years he had spent many hours watching and talking to doctors in hospitals. This was mainly because his wife was diagnosed with neuroendocrine tumour and had to spend weeks at a time in a London Hospital. He had also watched doctors who attended on his parents during the final years of their lives. As headmaster of some of the leading schools in Britain he had seen the way a number of his students were dealt with by doctors following injuries or accidents sustained during their time in school.

      He felt that the medical professionals he had seen were worryingly inattentive and were simply not present when they were in front of their patients. Some of the doctors did not connect with their patients and their minds were often elsewhere. Some of them just whizzed in and specialists often appeared to show off to their juniors. Sometimes it seemed like James Robertson Justice playing Sir Lancelot Spratt in the “Doctor films”.

      Sir Anthony Seldon plans to change all this when he becomes Vice Chancellor of Britain’s first private university in September 2015. He will be introducing lessons in Reflective meditation (mindfulness) for its medical students. He wants his trainee medics who will graduate from his university to have the ability to be calm and present in the moment, fully attentive to their patients.

      He feels the universities have been slow to wake up to their more rounded responsibilities. The focus had been too much on exams, and insufficiently on the development of the whole student. The reason why he felt doctors are not mindful is because, mindfulness is not in the culture of teaching hospitals. The curriculum was very cerebral. It should be at the heart of a medical school, an understanding of the importance of being present with the patient, being still, calm and really attentive.

      He thinks if doctors and nurses are not calm, present and showing a sense of loving dedication to the patient, then you might as well be wired up to a computer. He also feels doctors need to learn better handwriting.

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