TY - JOUR T1 - Metaphors for medicine: revealing reflections or just popular parodies? JF - Medical Humanities JO - J Med Humanit SP - 89 LP - 89 DO - 10.1136/mh.27.2.89 VL - 27 IS - 2 AU - Deborah Kirklin Y1 - 2001/12/01 UR - http://mh.bmj.com/content/27/2/89.abstract N2 - “‘ . . .before you get spoilt by it all. Before you become a fully qualified doctor, just give me a helping hand as a human being.’ (Kostoglotov: cancer patient)”1Are human beings irreversibly “spoilt” by medical training or merely disengaged from “normal” human interaction? If what is desired is a doctor who reaches out as a human being to his or her patients then it is important for educators to know why that sometimes fails to happen. Is the end product of medical training (sometimes) incapable of stretching out its hand or instead just disinclined to do so? If the latter, then presumably we should focus our energies on motivating practitioners to reach out by, for example, inspiring empathy. If, however, medical … ER -