Moments like these remind me why I took this path. I like talking to patients, getting their information and putting together the pieces while figuring out which information I still have to ask. Sometimes, I'd have to discern if they're lying. When I learn enough, I'd have to figure out what illness they have, like solving a puzzle. That's basically what it means to take a patient's history, the most important tool for diagnosis.
If I don’t know what the patient has after I have taken the history, I am in serious trouble.
-Alan Yudelt, MD