Trust.

If you’ve ever sat across from a doctor who was clearly exhausted, detached, or just going through the motions, this article will sting.

It’s about trust. About doctors losing theirs in the system—and patients losing theirs in doctors. I’ve lived through this breakdown. Thirty years ago, when I was diagnosed with brain cancer, the physician who delivered the news had the emotional range of a parking meter. I wasn't a person. I was a problem to be solved.

Fast forward to now, and we’re asking: Why are so many doctors struggling to connect with the very people they’re trained to help?

Burnout. Bureaucracy. Liability fear. Schedule quotas. Lack of training in actual human communication. And a system that values throughput over people. The piece nails how these structural failures trickle down to patient care. Especially around sensitive conversations like vaccinations, cancer screening, or end-of-life planning—where trust isn’t optional. It’s everything.

This isn’t just about bad bedside manner. It’s about public health. When people stop trusting doctors, they stop listening. That costs lives.

So here’s the question: How do we fix this? Do we re-train physicians to speak like humans? Do we start penalizing EMRs for sucking the soul out of every visit? Do we give doctors permission to be real again?

Or do we start rebuilding the broken relationship between doctor and patient one painful truth at a time?

If this hit home, toss it a like, repost, comment, or tag someone you may be ambivalent about. One click makes a bigger difference than you think.

SOURCE ➡️ https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/20/opinion/doctors-vaccines-patients.html?unlocked_article_code=1.BU8.JtqC.ENZZSx3DrzvD&smid=url-share