Amar Rughani

Crammer's Corner

This sounds pretty abstract, but holism embodies the broader mindset that characterizes good GPs and the way in which they see problems and their effects as part of a bigger picture. Why is this important? It is because health has many dimensions and is affected by a variety of factors beyond the simple causes of disease. For example, holism means recognizing that what the patient thinks and feels about an illness can strongly infl uence the degree to which they suffer and the rapidity with which they recover. This shows us that holism, one of the core values of general practice, is very strongly linked to patientcentredness which is another core value.

Managing Medical Complexity: Uncertainty and Risk:

In this article, we look at the second part of the performance area described above and will consider uncertainty and risk separately although in real life, they overlap. This competency is about aspects of care beyond managing straightforward problems, including the management of co-morbidity, uncertainty and risk, and the approach to health rather than just illness. The word pictures in Fig. 1 describe how we deal with uncertainty.