The benefits of referring patients to other patients

When doctors are stumped by challenging clinical cases, they often refer patients to specialists to assist with the diagnosis and management of the patients’ conditions.

“Doctors can learn a lot from expert patients.”
-Aniruddha Malpani, MD, medical director of Malpani Infertility Clinic in Mumbai, India

While specialists can be very skilled at making the correct diagnosis, they often do not delve very deeply in helping patients learn to live with their diseases. This is not the specialists’ core competency, nor should it be.

However, after the diagnosis has been made, patients’...