Skills Needed to be a Good Doctor
From 3arf
A doctor is an important job to have as people put their trust in you and you have a lot of power. It is well known that doctors have to go through many years of training before they are allowed to practice, however, there is more to being a doctor other than just knowing medicine. There are various qualities which make a doctor and below are just some of them.
- Non judgementalWhen you are practising as a doctor you will meet people from all walks of life. These people will have different concerns and reasons for visiting you and it is, therefore, vital that you remain non-judgemental. If you are judgemental then it will affect how you treat the patient, you may jump to conclusions, categorise people and make errors, if you remain open minded and accepting then it will help you to be able to help your patient.
- TrustworthyYou have to be trustworthy to be a doctor. You will need to be able to ensure that you abide by confidentiality laws too, to make sure that your patients' information is kept safe. As well as this kind of privacy you also need to be trustworthy in other areas such as being able to turn up to clinics on time, able to treat patients appropriately and be a valued team member. If you are not trustworthy then people will doubt your abilities and will not be able to get the best from you.
- ConfidenceWhen people visit a doctor they want to feel reassured and have answers. If you are not confident in what you are practicing then they will doubt you and not leave feeling reassured. If you doubt your abilities then you need to seek help or question whether this is the right field for you.
- Ability to steer a conversationWhen you are practising medicine you are stuck to tight times It is therefore vital that you have an ability to keep a conversation on track without appearing rude or short. You may only have ten minutes with a patient and in this time you need to establish lots of facts. Your patient may try to give you too much information which isn't relevant and it's important that you steer them in the right direction. Learning how to communicate well is vital, keep the conversation to the point and be polite when you steer it back on cause if it does veer.
- Communication skillsIf you cannot communicate properly then you will never be a good doctor. A good doctor needs to be able to communicate well on many levels. You need to know how much your patient will understand and the kind of language to use. You also need to have a good level of empathy and show that you are not only listening but caring too. You will need to communicate across different fields too; maybe you need to talk to a member in the research department or the pharmacy and so again, the language and skills needed will be different.
- IntelligenceDoctors need to be intelligent. This is because there is a lot of information and facts to learn. There are many different areas of medicine and it's important that you understand them, the body and how various things work together. If you lack intelligence then you will seriously struggle to be a good doctor as you won't be able to understand and then communicate issues with people.
Being a doctor is a difficult job and takes years of training. There are various skills which will make you a good doctor and these are very important if you want to be successful.
