More waiting rooms are filled these days with highly informed medical consumers seeking to be more informed about their medical conditions. They want to explore all promising treatments, both mainstream and alternative. To doctors, these patients seem needy and demanding. They expect a lot of attention, but are all too quick to question authority and battle doctors for control of medicine. To patients, though, such doctors come off as stodgy, even arrogant. Many walk away entirely from mainstream medicine or neglect to mention the alternative treatments they're using for fear of disapproval. The unfortunate result in each case is the same: miscommunication and missed opportunities. Patients fail to receive the best care available to them and doctor- patient relationships fall short of the mutually satisfying exchanges they could be. "How to Talk to Your Doctor" is a book for patients and doctors alike. It arms patients with the tools and knowledge they need to communicate better with doctors about using the best high-tech and alternative treatments while, also, helping doctors balance their scepticism of complementary and alternative approaches with open-mindedness.
Part One looks at how doctors are trained, what practising medicine is really like and why so many physicians still resist non conventional approaches. It, also, looks at how growing interest in alternative treatments is changing the practice of medicine and how it might change even further - for the better. Part Two offers a blueprint for patient and doctor for maintaining optimal health and dealing with chronic illness. It, also, explores complementary and conventional options for preventing and treating specific conditions.
One of America's foremost complementary medicine practitioners, founder and medical director of the Hoffman Center in New York City, author of numerous books and articles and host of the popular nationally syndicated radio program, Health Talk.