Fault and Default

Abstract

In the Hippocratic writings, one reads: "...[the physician] should keep aware of the fact that patients often lie when they state that they have taken certain medicines."Obviously "noncompliance" or "drug defaulting" is nothing new. Why, then, are most doctors so insensitive to the possibility that their patients often do not follow directions? Cynics will propose that the physician is simultaneously imbued with his omniscience, omnipotence and authority and yet so insecure in these beliefs that he cannot coexist with the painful notion that his patients disobey or deceive him.But surely we all know doctors for whom this cynical . . .