Table 3.
The components of the dimension of ‘being a good professional’ and behaviors unfit for ‘a good physician’ extracted from students’ accounts–themes/sub-themes/samples
| Being a good professional | Behaviors unfit for a ‘good physician’ | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
|
||||
| Sub-theme | Samples | ||||
|
|
|
||||
| Context | Theme | Grade-1 | Grade-6 | Grade-1 | Grade-6 |
| Professional responsibility | Relying on scientific knowledge | Doing the right thing scientifically | Doing the right thing scientifically | – | – |
| Competency | Being knowledgeable and skillful | Being knowledgeable and skillful Being able to update knowledge | ‘Being incompetent in terms of knowledge and skills’ | – | |
| Accuracy | – | Attentive conduct of the profession Giving the right treatment Making an accurate diagnosis | ‘Giving unnecessary treatments’ ‘Jeopardizing the patient's life with malpractice’ ‘Ordering unnecessary tests’ | ‘Being late for consultations or not showing up at all’ ‘Delaying the tests’ ‘Medical errors or negligence because of lack of knowledge and/or insensitivity towards patients’ | |
| Objectivity | Acting unbiased | Acting unbiased | ‘Not treating patients equally’ ‘Acting unbiased’ ‘Changing her/his behavior according to the persons’ appearance’ | ‘Not treating patients equally’ ‘Favoring private patients’ ‘Tending to treat patients badly because of their worldviews’ | |
| Being principled | Keeping financial interests in the background while conducting the profession | Prioritizing the professional responsibilities | ‘Performing unnecessary medical interventions to acquire unfair profit’ ‘Viewing medical professional just a means for making money’ ‘Viewing patients as customers’ | ‘Reflecting her/his own personal matters onto her/his professional life’ ‘Regardless of the expected benefit, giving treatment/prescribing drugs to please the patient’ | |
| Being able to work under pressure | Being able to think fast Being able to make decisions under pressure Cold-bloodedness | Being able to think fast | – | – | |
| Being a researcher | – | Making research | – | – | |
| Being an educator | – | – | – | ‘Not being a good educator’ ‘Not sparing time for educational duties’ | |
| Physician-patient relationship | Empathy | Establishing empathy with patients Being a good listener Sensitiveness to patients’ suffering | Establishing empathy with patients Being interested in patients Understanding patients | ‘Being indifferent to the patient's suffering’ | ‘Being insensitive while breaking bad news’ |
| Trustworthiness | Reliability Not viewing patients as customers | Being accessible | ‘Behaving indifferent towards the patient’ ‘Insensitivity’ ‘Reflecting her/his own personal concerns onto her/his relationship with the patient’ ‘Viewing patients as customers’ | ‘Being inaccessible’ ‘Not being close to the patient’ | |
| Communication | Being comprehensible/understandable Informing patients Having communication skills Being promising/giving hope Debonairness Relieving patients | Being comprehensible/understandable Informing patients/their relatives Having communication skills | ‘Behaving rude/inattentively towards patients/their relatives/third parties’ ‘Having a high ego’ ‘Looking down upon others in her/his relationship with patients’ | ‘Not providing the patient with adequate information/not informing the patient’ ‘Not touching the patient’ ‘Misbehaving towards the patient’ ‘Being angry and/or straight-faced’ ‘Not listening to the patient’ | |
| Respect for patients’ autonomy | Showing a caring attitude Acting without prejudice in the relationship with patients | Showing a caring attitude | – | ‘Using a language disrespectful to the patient's personality’. (e.g.,: ‘shooting the patient’, ‘pickle patient’) ‘Taking care of the patient as a human being, not just the illness’ | |
| Fidelity | – | Following up the patient Not letting the patient down | ‘Neglecting the patient’ | – | |
| Holistic treatment | – | Evaluating the patient in relation with her/his environment | – | – | |
| Respect for patients’ privacy | – | – | – | ‘Being disrespectful towards patients’ privacy’ | |
| Physician-physician/healthcare professional relationship | Teamwork | Being able to work as a part of a team Having good relationships with colleagues | Being able to work as a part of a team Having good relationships with colleagues | – | Abusing professional hierarchy (‘assigning subordinates with heavy workload’) |
| Competition | – | Being aware of her/his responsibilities towards colleagues | – | ‘Competing with colleagues’ | |
| Responsibility of the physician as an intellectual | Openness | Having flexible value judgments | – | – | – |
| Being active | Being socially active | – | – | – | |
| Leadership | Being a model for people around | – | – | – | |
| Having opinions on paramedical issues | Being lettered | – | – | – | |