Dr. Day

I'm currently part of Leadership Grand Rapids, a 9 month leadership development program in Grand Rapids.  As part of the experience the class works on Community Trustee Projects for local groups and organizations.  My small group is putting together a project for Michigan State's new Med School.  The school is interested in hearing from the community on what skills, in additional to the technical understanding of medicine, they should be training or adding to their curriculum for new doctors.  Over the course of the past couple months we've interviewed several people that work closely with doctors and the health care system.  But we wanted to add one more element to the study so we set up at my neighborhoods "Dr. Day" to talk to people that either don't have health care coverage or at least might not engage doctors on a regular basis.  We asked them "What makes a good doctor?" "What has disappointed or impressed you about doctors you visit?", and "What skills should new doctors have upon entering their practice?"

The first response was always, "They need to be a good listener".  Everyone shared their frustration with health care feeling like it has turned into a fast food restaurant instead of a nice family meal.  There were also a lot of comments about wanting to engage in their health care with the feeling like they were on a team with their doctors, nurses and care providers.  There were several stories from people that felt like they were put down by their doctors, being told that they just need to stop being fat or stop some behavior that they don't feel like they have control over.  On a positive note, several people had a lot of hope for younger doctors  that demonstrate better bedside manner and felt like female doctors where much easier to work with.