One Last Question: Opening Pandora’s Box?

Janet M. Townsend

doi:10.1370/afm.948

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Put those "last questions" on a new communication platform!
Joseph E Scherger

Published on: 25 March 2009
The Essential Pause
Auky van Beek

Published on: 20 March 2009
Opening Pandora's Box
Simon L. Auster

Published on: 16 March 2009

Published on: (25 March 2009)
Page navigation anchor for Put those "last questions" on a new communication platform!
Put those "last questions" on a new communication platform!
Joseph E Scherger, San Diego, CA, USA
Janet Townsend gives a moving case report of the crucial questions our patients have that are often not part of the "chief complaint" or "reason for visit". Our patients leave our brief visits with many unanswered questions. We usually do not have enough time to process their real fears about their health.
We need a new platform of communication and care so the important work of responding to our patient's que...
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Janet Townsend gives a moving case report of the crucial questions our patients have that are often not part of the "chief complaint" or "reason for visit". Our patients leave our brief visits with many unanswered questions. We usually do not have enough time to process their real fears about their health.
We need a new platform of communication and care so the important work of responding to our patient's questions is not dependent on what happens during brief encounters. When patients have an open access to personal communication anytime with their personal providers, we will learn much more about them, and be able to care in a "continuous healing relationship". The internet gives us that.
Competing interests: None declared
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Competing Interests: None declared.
Published on: (20 March 2009)
Page navigation anchor for The Essential Pause
The Essential Pause
Auky van Beek, Seattle, WA USA
In my point of view, the cornerstone of medicine can be backed up one step further, to that essential pause. It's a moment that often feels as if time stops and something drops in, usually a question. This may happen with one hand on the door and three patients waiting, when we make the choice to take a breath, turn around, speak the essential question hanging in the room, and open up to listening deeply. This process is e...
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In my point of view, the cornerstone of medicine can be backed up one step further, to that essential pause. It's a moment that often feels as if time stops and something drops in, usually a question. This may happen with one hand on the door and three patients waiting, when we make the choice to take a breath, turn around, speak the essential question hanging in the room, and open up to listening deeply. This process is encapsulated by Gregory Kramer (co-creator of Insight Dialogue) as Pause - Relax - Open - Trust Emergence - Speak the Truth - Listen Deeply. Words to live by in trying times.
Competing interests: None declared
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Competing Interests: None declared.
Published on: (16 March 2009)
Page navigation anchor for Opening Pandora's Box
Opening Pandora's Box
Simon L. Auster, Bethesda, MD USA
One almost feels like a grinch in challenging Janet Townsend's aphorism, "Listening is the cornerstone of medicine", in one form or another taught almost as an article of faith to entering medical students, yet I cannot disagree more vehemently. I would argue rather, that as the title of her Reflection itself suggests, it is questioning that is the cornerstone of medicine -- indeed, that the question is the most powerful...
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One almost feels like a grinch in challenging Janet Townsend's aphorism, "Listening is the cornerstone of medicine", in one form or another taught almost as an article of faith to entering medical students, yet I cannot disagree more vehemently. I would argue rather, that as the title of her Reflection itself suggests, it is questioning that is the cornerstone of medicine -- indeed, that the question is the most powerful tool available to the physician.
Townsend, JM. One last question: Opening Pandora's box. Annals of Family Medicine 2009;7:176-177
The above view is solely that of the author and does not represent that of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences or the Department of Defense
Competing interests: None declared
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Competing Interests: None declared.