Skip to main content

Main menu

  • Home
  • Articles
    • Current
    • Published Ahead of Print
    • Archive
    • Supplemental Issues
    • Collections - French
    • Collections - English
  • Info for
    • Authors & Reviewers
    • Submit a Manuscript
    • Advertisers
    • Careers & Locums
    • Subscribers
    • Permissions
  • About CFP
    • About CFP
    • About the CFPC
    • Editorial Advisory Board
    • Terms of Use
    • Contact Us
  • Feedback
    • Feedback
    • Rapid Responses
    • Most Read
    • Most Cited
    • Email Alerts
  • Blogs
    • Latest Blogs
    • Blog Guidelines
    • Directives pour les blogues
  • Mainpro+ Credits
    • About Mainpro+
    • Member Login
    • Instructions
  • Other Publications
    • http://www.cfpc.ca/Canadianfamilyphysician/
    • https://www.cfpc.ca/Login/
    • Careers and Locums

User menu

  • My alerts

Search

  • Advanced search
The College of Family Physicians of Canada
  • Other Publications
    • http://www.cfpc.ca/Canadianfamilyphysician/
    • https://www.cfpc.ca/Login/
    • Careers and Locums
  • My alerts
The College of Family Physicians of Canada

Advanced Search

  • Home
  • Articles
    • Current
    • Published Ahead of Print
    • Archive
    • Supplemental Issues
    • Collections - French
    • Collections - English
  • Info for
    • Authors & Reviewers
    • Submit a Manuscript
    • Advertisers
    • Careers & Locums
    • Subscribers
    • Permissions
  • About CFP
    • About CFP
    • About the CFPC
    • Editorial Advisory Board
    • Terms of Use
    • Contact Us
  • Feedback
    • Feedback
    • Rapid Responses
    • Most Read
    • Most Cited
    • Email Alerts
  • Blogs
    • Latest Blogs
    • Blog Guidelines
    • Directives pour les blogues
  • Mainpro+ Credits
    • About Mainpro+
    • Member Login
    • Instructions
  • RSS feeds
  • Follow cfp Template on Twitter
LetterLetters

Building emotional intelligence

Shaheen E. Lakhan
Canadian Family Physician April 2009, 55 (4) 351-352;
Shaheen E. Lakhan
  • Find this author on Google Scholar
  • Find this author on PubMed
  • Search for this author on this site
  • Article
  • eLetters
  • Info & Metrics
  • PDF
Loading

I recently read the Commentary “Because one shoe doesn’t fit all.”1 It is important to continually improve physician-patient relationships to best suit the needs of primary care and provide medical and emotional support to our patients. I was intrigued by the graphic representation of possible transformations in the doctor-patient relationship, which will certainly prove useful in medical training. I have seen physicians treat patients differently based on the difficulty of the cases. It would only be prudent to treat each patient in the same way on an emotional level, whether the problem is acute or chronic.

In cases that are purely medical, it seems likely that physicians might forget to incorporate patients’ emotions into assessment and treatment, and might not acknowledge their own emotional reactions to situations. I recently came across a study that examined emotional intelligence in physicians and how it affected patients’ trust in the patient-physician relationship.2 I hope that the awareness your article suggests1 will include emotional intelligence training for physicians so they might understand how patients’ personal and emotional contexts affect physicians’ treatment capabilities.

Last, I wanted to bring to your attention a study from the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in which the authors demonstrated that sleep deprivation had minimal effect on the ability to incorporate emotion and cognition to guide moral judgment in individuals with higher emotional intelligence.3 Increasing the emotional intelligence of our physicians might help to avoid the negative effects of stress.

  • Copyright© the College of Family Physicians of Canada

References

  1. ↵
    LussierMTRichardCBecause one shoe doesn’t fit allCan Fam Physician200854108992 (Eng)10969 (Fr)
    OpenUrlFREE Full Text
  2. ↵
    WengHCDoes the physician’s emotional intelligence matter? Impacts of the physician’s emotional intelligence on the trust, patient-physician relationship, and satisfactionHealth Care Manage Rev20083342808
    OpenUrlPubMed
  3. ↵
    KillgoreWDKillgoreDBDayLMLiCKamimoriGHBalkinTJThe effects of 53 hours of sleep deprivation on moral judgmentSleep200730334552
    OpenUrlPubMed
PreviousNext
Back to top

In this issue

Canadian Family Physician: 55 (4)
Canadian Family Physician
Vol. 55, Issue 4
1 Apr 2009
  • Table of Contents
  • About the Cover
  • Index by author
Print
Download PDF
Article Alerts
Sign In to Email Alerts with your Email Address
Email Article

Thank you for your interest in spreading the word on The College of Family Physicians of Canada.

NOTE: We only request your email address so that the person you are recommending the page to knows that you wanted them to see it, and that it is not junk mail. We do not capture any email address.

Enter multiple addresses on separate lines or separate them with commas.
Building emotional intelligence
(Your Name) has sent you a message from The College of Family Physicians of Canada
(Your Name) thought you would like to see the The College of Family Physicians of Canada web site.
CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.
Citation Tools
Building emotional intelligence
Shaheen E. Lakhan
Canadian Family Physician Apr 2009, 55 (4) 351-352;

Citation Manager Formats

  • BibTeX
  • Bookends
  • EasyBib
  • EndNote (tagged)
  • EndNote 8 (xml)
  • Medlars
  • Mendeley
  • Papers
  • RefWorks Tagged
  • Ref Manager
  • RIS
  • Zotero
Respond to this article
Share
Building emotional intelligence
Shaheen E. Lakhan
Canadian Family Physician Apr 2009, 55 (4) 351-352;
del.icio.us logo Digg logo Reddit logo Twitter logo Facebook logo Google logo Mendeley logo
  • Tweet Widget
  • Facebook Like
  • Google Plus One

Jump to section

  • Article
    • References
  • Info & Metrics
  • eLetters
  • PDF

Related Articles

  • No related articles found.
  • PubMed
  • Google Scholar

Cited By...

  • No citing articles found.
  • Google Scholar

More in this TOC Section

  • Excellent chronic pain guideline
  • Treating the vaccine hesitant
  • The silence of Francophone family physicians or unilateral bilingualism?
Show more Letters

Similar Articles

Navigate

  • Home
  • Current Issue
  • Archive
  • Collections - English
  • Collections - Française

For Authors

  • Authors and Reviewers
  • Submit a Manuscript
  • Permissions
  • Terms of Use

General Information

  • About CFP
  • About the CFPC
  • Advertisers
  • Careers & Locums
  • Editorial Advisory Board
  • Subscribers

Journal Services

  • Email Alerts
  • Twitter
  • RSS Feeds

Copyright © 2022 by The College of Family Physicians of Canada

Powered by HighWire