Main description:

This third volume in the Companion to Medical Humanities series considers the concept of treatment as an active process which produces an outcome, be it effective, inappropriate or inadequate. It invites the reader to examine the relevance of the patients' belief in any given treatment and their confidence in the practitioner. Against a person-centred backdrop, it investigates boundaries, and reflects on the practical demands on a health care system limited in its resources, where the price of choice for one may be the restriction of service for the other. It also questions the supposed contrasts between treatment and cure, redefining the meaning of care in daily practice. It offers inspirational reading for all academics and professionals with an interest in the medical humanities, as well as researchers in philosophy of medicine and medical ethics. CPD with Radcliffe. This book can be used to achieve CPD (Continuing Professional Development) points through directed reading. We provide a free online form, and downloadable certificate for your appraisal portfolio. For more information and to claim CPD points on this book, visit www.radcliffehealth.com/cpd

Contents:

About the editors and authors. Introduction. Acknowledgement. Playing God (poem by Glenn Colquhoun). The patients' stories. On treatment and its effects. Wonderful treatment. Treatment - a matter between subjects. Deciding on treatment. Paternalism, power and autonomy. Symptoms without disease: territory without a map. The paradox of placebo - real and sham in medicine. Considering the alternatives or Who is the medicine man? Boldness and temperance in treatment. Index.