Theme issue for patients: Why does the media want to lead  doctors?

doi:10.1136/bmj.327.7412.448-c

BMJ 2003;327:448 (23 August), doi:10.1136/bmj.327.7412.448-c

Letter

Theme issue for patients

Why does the media want to lead doctors?

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR—The editorial comment by Smith is characteristicof the worst kind of wrong thinking—in that it is onlyhalf wrong and so escapes comment on the basis of the partthat is half right.¹

He is right that we all consider patient interests of the greatest importance and acknowledge the need to represent their viewsin clinical issues. He is right that the interests of individualpatients have sometimes been placed second to the educationalvalue of presenting them. The recent departures with evolvingcase histories were interesting, including the patients' contribution.However, he is wrong on all the rest. He is wrong to scornthe NHS on the basis that it does not share the priorities and infrastructure of a commercial supermarket. He is wrong toconsider it offensive to patients that doctors write professionalletters to each other that contain information that is morecomplex and . . . [Full text of this article]