In this final volume of his best-selling 'Inner' trilogy, Roger Neighbour explores the relationship between a doctor's professional and private selves. He suggests that the mind of every doctor retains an untrained 'ordinary human being' part - their Inner Physician - which makes an important, though often neglected, contribution to medical practice. This 'Inner Physician', which he also describes as the 'amateur within' or the 'expert minus the expertise', plays a major role in diagnosis and treatment, and is the chief source of insight, empathy and clinical acumen. Roger shows that skilled use of the Inner Physician is one thing that distinguishes the generalist from the specialist.

The Inner Physician deals with the relationship between different parts of the individual doctor's own mind. In the final volume of his 'Inner' trilogy, Roger Neighbour, author of The Inner Consultation, explores the relationship between a doctor's professional and private selves. He suggests that the mind of every doctor retains an untrained 'ordinary human being' part - their Inner Physician - which makes an important, though often neglected, contribution to medical practice. The Inner Physician, which he calls 'the amateur within' or 'the expert minus the expertise', plays a major role in diagnosis and treatment, and is the chief source of insight, empathy and clinical acumen. Drawing on ideas ranging from Greek philosophy to catastrophe theory and quantum mechanics, but written in an engaging easy-to-read style, The Inner Physician makes a powerful case for humanity, thoughtfulness and self-awareness as hallmarks of the effective clinician. It will be challenging but inspiring to GPs at every career stage, and also to specialists keen to understand how their own work fits into medicine's 'big picture'.Coming at a time when doctors are under pressure to function more as biomedical technicians than as caring professionals, The Inner Physician aims to help GPs rediscover their pride in the human aspects of their work with patients. Readers should be comforted and inspired to have confirmed what they always knew - that they themselves are an important factor in their clinical effectiveness.