Jennifer Ashton Quotes

Communication is everything, especially as a doctor, you need to communicate with your patients.

If doctors just spent more time with their patients so they felt more reassured, that might help.

Care more for the individual patient than for the special features of the disease. . . . Put yourself in his place . . . The kindly word, the cheerful greeting, the sympathetic look - these the patient understands.

The patient is the nucleus of the health care system.

We are guests in our patients' lives.

I'm a terrible patient, and I find that doctors can be very condescending.

What we have now is doctors who are actually better technically at what they're doing in their specialty than 30 or 40 years ago, but we lost the relationship, when the doctor would look people in the eye and say, 'I care about you. We can do this together.'

The physicians of one class feel the patients and go away, merely prescribing medicine. As they leave the room they simply ask the patient to take the medicine. They are the poorest class of physicians.

As a doctor, I've learned the importance and value of listening.

We sometimes think that the best doctors are the ones who have the most specialized knowledge or the fanciest degrees, but in fact, study upon study, including one published in the 'New England Journal of Medicine,' show that the best doctors are the ones who also know how to connect with their patients.

I wanted to show people that doctors are humans, too. It's important for us to be around other people - that way, we can understand our patients better rather than just walking into a room, barking orders, and walking out.

Patients know what patients want to know.

You need a good bedside manner with doctors or you will get nowhere.

The most exquisite pleasure in the practice of medicine comes from nudging a layman in the direction of terror, then bringing him back to safety again.

A modern health and social care system has to be completely focussed on the needs of its users.

The very first requirement in a hospital is that it should do the sick no harm.

Cure sometimes, treat often, comfort always.

Practicing medicine is not only my vocation, it gives me an opportunity to continue to be in direct contact with people, to see them and hear their needs.

I worked in the NHS as a hospital orderly during my national service, and people thought it was a noble service. But over the years it's lost its humanity.

Lets take away the incentives to do 'to' patients and instead create incentives to do 'for' patients, to be 'with' patients. We don't need to do comparative effectiveness trials to see if that works; we can just ask patients.

Patients know in a heartbeat if they're getting a clumsy exam.

Ever tried to get sleep in a hospital? Ever wonder if anyone even taught them what care is? Some hospitals are great, but some sure aren't.

I was good at being a doctor; my patients liked me. At times people trust you with things they wouldn't tell their spouses. It was a real privilege.

Good physicians are rarely dispassionate. They agonize and self-doubt over patients.

Does anyone really go into nursing intending to be apathetic, cold and removed from suffering? I find that very difficult to believe.