[At last a humanistic medicine?].

BACKGROUND

We have entered a time of enormous and rapid technological advance. We must pause and reflect on the role of humanism in medicine on that part of our professional calling that denotes the responsibility we have for caring, and the relationship between our art and our science.

OBJECTIVE

Humanism is defined as a mode of thought or action in which human interests, values and dignity are taken to be of primary importance. But Heidegger thinks that humanism esteems man too low. The purpose of this article is to review the sense of the word "humanism" in medicine.

METHOD

Theories of four general sorts are identified and explained here.

RESULTS

Man is inmeasurably more than a rational animal as humanistic medicine postulates. We must pass beyond the traditional interpretations of the nature of man, therefore beyond humanism and humanistic medicines.

CONCLUSIONS

It is better to drop the word completely, with the danger of being taken for anti-humanistic, rather than run the risk of having a subject ist interpretation. We must think the nature of man in terms of its exclusive relationship to his being and to Being.