Abstract
In this personal viewpoint, I grapple with the barrier I felt creating authentic relationships with my patients. Through this introspection, I examine the medical school experience with the standardized patients, exploring how this training may have promoted my emotional disengagement. I then promote an alternative for medical schools to increase student exposure to patients early in their training, as a way to learn vital history taking and physical exam techniques while still allowing them to create genuine relationships with their patients. Finally, I discuss my experience with this curriculum at my institution and the effect it has had on my own as well as my students’ clinical experiences.
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Ian Gleaner
Ian Gleaner, MD, Instructor of Medicine, Cooper Medical School of Rowan University and Cooper University Hospital, Camden, NJ.