What Baseball Can Teach Doctors

By MICHAEL MILLENSON Baseball, like medicine, is deeply imbued with a sense of tradition, and no team more so than the New York Yankees, disdainful of innovations like placing players’ names on the backs of their jerseys and resistant to eroding strict standards related to haircuts and beards. It’s why doctors and patients alike should pay special attention to why the Yankees parted ways with their old manager and what they now seek instead. In a word: “collaboration.” That’s the takeaway from a recent New York Times article examining why the Yankees declined to re-sign manager Joe Girardi despite his stellar “outcomes” (to use a medical term); i.e., the best record in baseball during his 10 years at the Yankees’ helm. But Yankees executives believe the game has changed. The model for future success is the Los Angeles Dodgers, the tradition- and cash-rich franchise on the opposite coast that went to this year’s World Series while the Yankees sat home. The new way to win? According to Dodgers executives, it requires a combination of statistical analysis, shared decisions and communication between and among all stakeholders based on collaborative relationships. Look at that: evidence, shared decision making and communication! It’s participatory medicine in pinstripes! Beyond a reverence for tradition, the parallels between baseball and medicine are… striking. Doctors manage individual patients, and baseball, while a team sport, is very focused on individ...
Source: The Health Care Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Michael Millenson Source Type: blogs