Doctors must be gentle.

Abstract

The second author, who is a doctor, describes a message written by her 6-year-old granddaughter, Ansel. The message said that doctors must be patient, kind, loving, giving, generous, and forgiving. Ansel has always said she wants to be a physician when she grows up. When her grandmother asked her about what she wrote, Ansel said: "I was pretending to study to be a doctor, and this was a test I had to take about what makes a good doctor." The grandmother asked her: How do you know these things? She said: "What if you're doing surgery, or a little kid is nervous and getting a shot? You have to be kind and distract the kid so you're halfway through before they notice." (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).