TY - JOUR AU - Eikeland, Hanne-Lise AU - Ørnes, Knut AU - Finset, Arnstein AU - Pedersen, Reidar PY - 2014 DA - 2014/08/09 TI - The physician’s role and empathy – a qualitative study of third year medical students JO - BMC Medical Education SP - 165 VL - 14 IS - 1 AB - Empathy is important in ensuring the quality of the patient-physician relationship. Several studies have concluded that empathy declines during medical training, especially during the third year. However, there is little empirical research on what may influence a medical student’s empathy. In addition, studies of empathy in medicine have generally been dominated by quantitative approaches, primarily self-assessment questionnaires. This is a paradox given the complexity and importance of empathy. In this paper we explore medical students’ opinions of what may foster or inhibit empathy during medical school, with a particular emphasis on how empathy is influenced by the initiation into the physician’s role. SN - 1472-6920 UR - https://doi.org/10.1186/1472-6920-14-165 DO - 10.1186/1472-6920-14-165 ID - Eikeland2014 ER -