The soft touch: Teaching "families" in a Family Practice Residency Diploma Program

Teaching Families is a 12-session course in the Family Practice Residency Diploma Program at the School of Medicine at Tel-Aviv University, Israel. It is taught jointly by a family physician and an expert in the specific field; in this case, a social worker and family therapist. The residents are called upon to use attentive listening and a broad view of the family as diagnostic tools, just as if these were blood tests or CAT scans. The challenge of introducing "soft" matters to new physicians, oriented toward quantification and medical technology, is compounded by the fact that the course cannot be graded. Processes observed during the course serve as a model for the developing relationship between family physicians and their patients. In this article, we follow the changes undergone by one participant, as observed by both teachers, and enhanced by reflection with a third family physician, herself a former teacher in the course.