A few days ago, I had a discussion with a medical student about what is the single trait for a physician, that I think is the most important.

I told him that after quite a few years of practice and also meeting quite a few physicians as a patient, I can say that being humble is probably the most important.

A physician who is truly humble realizes the limitations of medicine, realizes his own limitations and has decided to become a physician because he/she truly cares about other people, and not as an "ego-trip" . He is also more kind and forgiving to himself (as he doesn't think he has to be god) and also to others. He can therefore apologize to patients and try to correct inevitable errors. He can also accept the thoughts and ideas of colleagues and thank them for seeing something he missed or bringing to his attention something he didn't know. This doesn't mean that he doesn't have high standards or doesn't strive to do the best for his patient. Or that he/she doesn't want his work to be appreciated by his patients and colleagues. On the contrary, more times than not such physicians constantly learn from their patients, their colleagues and the medical literature, as they know how much they don't know and how much they still have to learn.

The vast majority of those who I saw as my role models during my training, were like that. And the same applies to my own physicians.

The worst mistakes in my management were done out of shear arrogance.