New doctors are not kind to their predecessors. Here’s why.

I had the good fortune of practicing family medicine from the 70s to the early 10s. It was the Golden Age. After doing a family practice residency in a community hospital and serving a short stint as an assistant residency director, I started out in my practice that lasted almost 40 years. Here is the story of how I got the ball rolling. I was part of a large family practice group. Dr. A was an elderly GP with a devoted patient clientele. His patients loved him. He gave them prescriptions, vitamins, B-12 and cortisone shots. He did use the lab and x-ray but never referred. He would diagnose an MI correctly and then treat the patient with follow-up house calls. He didn’t really know what a cardiologist or most specialists actually did. Maybe he was lucky, but we never heard that many of his patients died. Yet, he was paternalistic and pre-patient education. Our group decided he was a risk and delegated to me the thankless job of convincing him to retire. I was successful, and surprisingly he asked me to take over his patient load. During my practice career, I saw many, many patients that stayed with me my entire career including Dr. A’s patients. They must have sensed some of their beloved retired doctor in my style of practice, and they stayed with me and referred their family and friends. For most of my career, I had a lot of face to face and hand holding time, very little documentation, and minimal outside interference. I delivered babies for the first decade. I was a c...
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - Category: Journals (General) Authors: Tags: Physician Primary care Source Type: blogs