Suffering, Meaning, and Healing: Challenges of Contemporary Medicine

The Article in Brief

Suffering, Meaning, and Healing: Challenges of Contemporary Medicine

Thomas R. Egnew

Background As a result of changes in contemporary society, doctors are expected to both cure disease and help patients transcend suffering: to be physician-healers. Physician-healers use the power of the doctor-patient relationship to help patients reconnect to the world beyond illness, find meaning in their illness experience, particularly through their own stories, and cope with the impersonality of technology. A health care delivery system focused on holistic healing would promote accessible, ongoing care; home visits; equitable reimbursement for clinicians to spend time with (rather than doing things to) patients; and equal funding for mental health issues. In addition to better serving the chronically ill, developing the role of physician-healer may help stem the tide of physician burnout and restore a sense of awe and mystery to medicine by reinstating the personal power of the physician as a therapeutic agent.