>Some of what people object ot about doctors comes from a feeling that they
>ought to be like shamans. This feeling affects many, usually
>unconsciously, and, unfortunately, some doctors feed into it. Since part
>of what I see as my job is to help physicians in training develop some
>psychosocial sense of their patients, over and above their medical
>understanding, I try to help them understand that she short-term glow of
>approbation when they accomplish, quickly and easily, something good is
>only part of what medical practice is about.
i forget which study it was that my mother referred me to, but it was about how physicians got their information about drugs. numbah#1 source: advertising in the trades, in the forms of various promotional materials distrubted to their offices, visits, etc. but more than that, part of the advertising pitch is thins like a nice dinner. when i was in the catering biz, our biggest clients/biggest spenders were the drug companies. every month the sales rep from merck, sharpe and dohm (sp?) and other companies used to put on wonderful small dinner parties with the best of everything -- just for those overworked professionals.
dunk, a subscriber to the pulp-culture list, does something in this field. can't recall right now, but he's gone on and on before about how things like the "flu cure" they were promoting not too long ago was a lot of b.s. hype, but nonetheless the docs 'bought it' and prescribed it profusely.
the sense among the public you speak of is not monolithic or univocal, but where it exists, it has been encouraged and promoted by physicians themselves. they actively encourage that kind of mystification and NOT because they are greedy egomaniacs. to interpret me as saying this is silliness.
kelley