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)

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 (Figure 1-1). 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