Clinical schools have sometimes said they want to recognise the importance of cultivating creativity and paying closer attention to students' emotional development. Unfortunately, guidance in developing techniques to handle issues raised by uncertainty do not feature prominently in most curricula. It was never realistic, however, to expect that the introduction of social science and medical ethics to undergraduate training would encourage the necessary adjustments to thinking and practice. A more profound focus on the person is required in medical training from the start of training. Of course, I am not encouraging a dualism of mind and body.
Biological knowledge needs to be integrated with personal understanding.
Enlightened attitudes can only be developed by being open to the limits of medical practice. A greater recognition of the anxieties experienced by all professional disciplines involved in the delivery of health care should facilitate better use of resources. This means clinicians must explicitly acknowledge and understand the importance of imprecision before such co-operation can be productive. The myth of biological psychiatry By the time doctors begin psychiatric training, they are enmeshed in medical indoctrination. There should be little surprise then about their unthinking acceptance of the biological model of mental illness.