Challenge of culture, conscience, and contract to general practitioners' care of Challenge of culture, conscience, and contract to general practitioners' care of their own health: qualitative study
Ofcourse GPs do not want to "dump" on their colleaques by going off
sick, but there is another attititude which pervades this issue.How often
have you heard a group of doctors each blighted with varying degrees of
colds or flus quip, " of course if we were patients/ receptionist/ nurses
we'd all be off for atleast a week" To paraphrase Basil Fawlty, do I
detect the faint hint of singeing martyr? Or the other John
Cleese/Pythonesque analogy, "My temperature was 110 and I still went to
work. That's nothing! I came to work still attached to the ITU ventilator
. That's nothing! I defibrillated myself with a set of old jump leads and
got the patient to "bag and mask" me while I auscultated his chest. That's
nothing!" etc etc.
These attitudes imply that those who succumb to ill health are quite
literally lesser mortals.We don't think we're superhuman, it's just that
every one else is weak.We ignore our own health to our peril, but we do
gain a shared, smug sense of martyrdom.We know we are human individually
, but can we admit this to each other or the rest of society ?Obviously
this is all mere anecdote and opinion. It is interesting to consider if
even qualitative research methods would have the ability to disclose these
or similar attitudes, perhaps a fly on the wall during coffee break ?
Rapid Response:
" Superhuman Martyrs"
Ofcourse GPs do not want to "dump" on their colleaques by going off
sick, but there is another attititude which pervades this issue.How often
have you heard a group of doctors each blighted with varying degrees of
colds or flus quip, " of course if we were patients/ receptionist/ nurses
we'd all be off for atleast a week" To paraphrase Basil Fawlty, do I
detect the faint hint of singeing martyr? Or the other John
Cleese/Pythonesque analogy, "My temperature was 110 and I still went to
work. That's nothing! I came to work still attached to the ITU ventilator
. That's nothing! I defibrillated myself with a set of old jump leads and
got the patient to "bag and mask" me while I auscultated his chest. That's
nothing!" etc etc.
These attitudes imply that those who succumb to ill health are quite
literally lesser mortals.We don't think we're superhuman, it's just that
every one else is weak.We ignore our own health to our peril, but we do
gain a shared, smug sense of martyrdom.We know we are human individually
, but can we admit this to each other or the rest of society ?Obviously
this is all mere anecdote and opinion. It is interesting to consider if
even qualitative research methods would have the ability to disclose these
or similar attitudes, perhaps a fly on the wall during coffee break ?
Competing interests: No competing interests