Treatment of Pain with Medicine

Abstract

A key concept of modern Chinese medicine is “We recruit the patient to be a member of his own treatment team.” If implemented in a Western society, that crucial step would require a change of attitude by both therapist and patient. The doctor would have to relinquish his authoritarian status as priest-healer. The patient would have to step up his activity and involvement and work hard to improve his knowledge and understanding. In most hospitals today, the patient’s admission is a rite of passage whereby he sacrifices his independent identity. Stripped of his familiar clothes, dressed in a bizarre smock, wearing a numbered identity tag on his wrist like a newborn baby, he reverts to an infantile status, with food, shelter, and activity all regulated by omnipotent adults. Just as “Daddy knows best” for the child, “Doctor knows best” for the patient.