The physician charter on medical professionalism

doi:10.1136/bmjusa.02080008

BMJ, doi: 10.1136/bmjusa.02080008, (Published 9 October 2002)

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The physician charter on medical professionalism

From BMJ USA 2002;August:469

Warning that "changes in the health care delivery systems in virtually all industrialized countries threaten the very natureand values of medical professionalism," in 1999 the American Collegeof Physicians-American Society of Internal Medicine, AmericanBoard of Internal Medicine, and European Federation of InternalMedicine launched the Medical Professionalism Project (www.professionalism.org).Earlier this year the Project released a Charter on Medical Professionalism,which sets out three fundamental principles:

Principle of primacy of patient welfare
Principle of patient autonomy
Principle of social justice

The charter outlines 10 professional responsibilities, which include a commitment to:

1 Professional competence

2 Honesty with patients

3 Patient confidentiality

4 Maintaining appropriate relations with patients

5 Improving quality of care

6 Improving access to care

7 Just distribution of finite resources

8 Scientific knowledge

9 Maintaining trust by managing conflicts of interest

10 Professional responsibilities

Details of what these responsibilities entail are available in the full report (Medical Professionalism in the New Millennium:A Physician Charter. Ann Intern Med. 2002;136:243-246), whichis available online at www.annals.org/issues/v136n3/full/200202050-00012.html