This book, written by luminaries in medical education, provides educators with both the theoretical underpinnings and the practical application of an equal emphasis on understanding the persons that doctors treat as well as the problems (including but not exclusively diseases) that bring them to the attention of a medical professional. It is a refreshing approach that emphasizes what medicine should actually be about.
J. Donald Boudreau, a graduate of Dalhousie University, is a respiratory physician. He is a former Associate Dean of undergraduate medical education at McGill University, a member of its Centre for Medical Education, and a Professor of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation, a foundation dedicated to promoting humanism in medicine.
Eric J. Cassell is Emeritus Professor of Public Health at Weill Medical College of Cornell University and Adjunct Professor of Medicine at McGill University. He is also a fellow of the Hastings Centre, a member of the Institutes of Health of the National Academy of Sciences, and Master of the American College of Physicians.
Abraham Fuks is a clinical immunologist with experience in research and clinical practice. He served as Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at McGill from 1995 to 2006 and was a Visiting Professor in the Department of Social Medicine at Harvard University in 2007-2008. He has an ongoing scholarly interest in the language of medicine and its metaphoric structure and in the role of narratives in the patient-physician relationship.