Garth Rattray | Compassionate care in a digital world
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The World Organization of Family Doctors (WONCA) is a not-for-profit professional organisation founded in 1972. It represents the interests of family physicians and general practitioners and is dedicated to the advancement of the practice of good medicine to enhance high-quality family care. Its mission is to promote “high standards in family medicine, education, research, and service, with a focus on person-centred, equitable, and continuous care”.
WONCA observes World Family Doctor Day annually on May 19. This year’s theme is “Compassionate Care in a Digital World”. WONCA has decided to focus on “integrating digital tools and AI in primary care while maintaining human-centric, empathetic care”. At the heart of this topic is the intent that technology supports, and not distracts from, the patient-doctor relationship, while enhancing the trust that patients have in family doctors.
WONCA believes the practice of family medicine should guide digitalisation and not the other way around. AI should benefit both patients and doctors. Although inanimate integrated circuits, processors, and pixilated images are antithetical to the warmth, empathy, and compassion of family medicine, WONCA wants modern tech to “clear the path for compassionate care”.
Whereas the use of digitalisation in general, and AI in particular, has immensely enhanced the ability to provide patient care, I have heard several patients complain that they find doctors who input information by typing -in their presence- to appear distracted and distant. Some patients also believe that some doctors depend too heavily on tech to diagnose, investigate, treat, and plan forward.
Many patients see tech as the depersonalisation of family medicine and the reliance on tech for making life and death decisions. Many patients still prefer the face-to-face, person-to-person interaction without the assistance or incorporation of tech.
However, digitalisation and the use of AI are utilitarian and often occur behind the scenes. They are essential in telemedicine, electronic health records, data storage, scheduling appointments, patient engagement (communication), office administration, assessing and transferring results, and research. AI can also be used for voice-to-text note taking, enhancing diagnostic accuracy, analysing disease risk, assisting in managing chronic diseases, and reviewing the safety and compatibility of prescribed medications, among other things.
The Caribbean College of Family Physicians (Jamaica Chapter), the Association of General Practitioners of Jamaica, along with the Family Medicine Programme (UWI Mona) will be celebrating World Family Doctor Day 2026 [today] with a conference themed “Compassionate Care in a Digital World: Where Are We?”. My contribution to the annual magazine is the following poem:
Digitalisation is zeros and ones at its very core,
But patient care requires compassion, it is so much more.
We are not made of circuits and wires, or run by electricity,
We are greater than our cells and synapses, physiology and biochemistry.
The binary code that digitalisation uses is nothing more than a tool,
But the compassion that we practise cannot be taught in school.
Medicine is far more than a science, it’s an art, that’s obviously true,
When it comes to caring for patients, our very best we must always do.
Cellphones, desktops, laptops and tablets, these things we often use,
To assist us in caring for our patients, from a wide variety we can choose.
Although we retain our prime principle of providing very good care,
Technology has come a far way, and with it we gladly pair.
We reach out, communicate, and investigate with tech at our fingertips,
While we employ our humanity, with the words coming from our lips.
Tech never leads when we serve those with whom we are entrusted,
It’s an efficient adjunct, compassion is number one, that’s never adjusted.
The use of digitalisation in Family Medicine is really nothing new,
We’ve been telephoning and emailing patients for decades, then it grew.
Social media platforms were incorporated to enhance patient involvement,
With community building and information dissemination enhancement.
Telemetry use in medicine has been around for more than a few years.
It allows physicians to monitor their patients and share with their peers.
It reduces morbidity and mortality, and can keep the patients safe
The technology can work wonders, even though nobody is face to face.
When the COVID-19 pandemic was raging in places both far and near,
When seeing patients who were ill sometimes precipitated great fear.
Technology came to the rescue, its use saved innumerable lives,
Digital platforms were constructed; since those days, the concept thrives.
When paper files keep piling up, and there’s no place left to store,
When it’s difficult carrying dockets around, as we go door to door.
When retrieving specific information means sifting through years of notes,
Digitalisation solves all those problems without making us look like dolts.
And through it all, modernisation gives way to some things forever right,
From society’s laws and the Hippocratic Oath, we never can take flight.
Do no harm and confidentiality will always be foremost on physicians’ list,
The human element always comes first; digitalisation is only there to assist.
Tech evolved and AI was born, it reasoned and mimicked human thought.
It automated, documented, analysed, scheduled, assisted and brought,
A huge reservoir of information, an infinite ability to store and retrieve.
With all its genius, it can’t be happy, sad, commiserate, or grieve.
Despite AI’s convenience, power and attributes, a human doctor it is not.
Despite our use of, and dependency on digitalisation, none of us is a bot.
The essentiality of compassionate care, with empathy, respect and dignity,
The doctor is always supreme, because medicine is all about humanity.
Garth Rattray is a medical doctor with a family practice and author of ‘The Long and Short of Thick and Thin’. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and garthrattray@gmail.com.