the apostolic function
Last reviewed 01/2018
Michael Balint observed in 1957 that a doctor's personality interacts with medical training to produce a unique way of dealing with patients. Doctors tend to avoid examining their own behaviour and so a fixed style develops.
Balint called this the 'Apostolic Function'. This incorporates the doctor's beliefs about how patients ought to behave when ill, how they should behave with doctors and how they should cooperate in their cure.