THE ONE THING YOUR DOCTOR SHOULD NEVER DO

​“Words are of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.”
Rudyard Kipling

It’s not what you say but how you say it

It wasn’t long ago that doctors believed it was better for a patient not to tell them bad news
believing that it would worsen their condition. In the late 1970’s that changed when the practice
of medicine began to recognize the patients right to know their medical situation allowing them
to make a more informed decision about their treatment. That pendulum has swung again. They
were kind-of right both times, bad news could seemingly cause the patient to get worse and
patients do have a right to know the truth about their conditions. Today it’s believed that the
mind body connection coupled with our bodies innate ability to heal itself plays a huge role in our
health and healing. One of the most obvious tools to enhance this aspect of the process is the
power of the WORD to convey positive messaging and instill hope, but that’s not typically what
patients experience. Doctors admittedly are not trained to communicate but a callous bed side
manner is just lazy and can do a lot of harm. Theres actually a word for this it’s called “nocebo”
the reverse of placebo. In essence your body metabolizes bad news and becomes sicker, or it
metabolizes good news and starts to heal. Ethical disclosure doesn’t need to be brutal, the
shock your body feels hearing derogatory news is negatively affecting billions of cells in your
body making it even harder to heal

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