Family physicians

Caring without science is well-intentioned kindness, but not medicine. On the other hand, science without caring empties medicine of healing and negates the great potential of  an ancient profession. The two complement and are essential to the art of  doctoring.

B.LOWN(1996, p. 223)

Figure 1-1  The Doctor by Sir Luke Fildes, 1891. (© Tate, London, 2005.)  

Family physicians do not just treat patients; they also care for people. This caring function of family medicine empha- sizes the personalized approach to understanding the patient as a person, respecting the person as an individual, and showing compassion for his or her discomfort. The best illustration of a caring and compassionate physician is The Doctor by Sir Luke Fildes (Figure1-1).The painting shows a physician at the bedside of an ill child in the preantibiotic era. The physician in the painting is Dr. Murray, who cared for Sir Luke Fildes’s son, who died Christmas morning, 1877. The painting has become the symbol for medicine as a caring profession.