Article contents
The white coat and the liaison psychiatrist
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 January 2018
Extract
Medical care in general hospitals is a collective activity and liaison psychiatrists may become part of this process. Cornerstones of successful management are co-operation with colleagues and ‘teamwork’, although these elusive goals are not always achieved. A shared uniform is one possible solution to improve this teamwork, the white coat being the livery of the hospital doctor. Furthermore, patients may appreciate a uniform. One survey of 200 North American general hospital in-patients showed the white coat to be surprisingly popular (Dunn et al, 1987); 65% of those replying wanted to see their doctor in a white coat. But the white coat is often unpopular with doctors and perhaps a more relevant question is whether it makes any difference to patient behaviour.
- Type
- Articles
- Information
- Creative Commons
- This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
- Copyright
- Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1990
References
- 1
- Cited by
eLetters
No eLetters have been published for this article.