Featuring Dr. Daniel Ngui, BSc, (P.T.), MD, CFPC, FCFP, Family Doctor

Duration: 1 minute, 45 seconds

Family medicine is a medical specialty devoted to the comprehensive care of all patients of all ages, all genders, all diseases and all socioeconomic backgrounds.

Family medicine is a specialty that really focuses on understanding the patient in the context of their illness experience. Knowing their issues of their family history, as well as knowing what community factors affect them.

Family physicians are physicians who focus on disease prevention and health promotion. We try to focus on four principles. And the four principles are that the patient-doctor relationship is really central to the role of the family doctor.

Family physicians are skilled clinicians. Skilled clinicians are the type of people who can understand the latest up-to-date research studies and can apply them to day-to-day practice. Family physicians are a resource to a defined population, in that we have to know our population, know what type of diseases or outbreaks are happening so we can deal with it.

And finally, family medicine is a community-based discipline, in which we try to provide services in the hospital, in emergency room departments, in specialty clinics but mostly in outpatient care.

By understanding the role of the family doctor and what family medicine is, patients can start to spend more time with physicians and their offices. The more time we spend the more we get to know one another, trust one another and truly begin to provide the best possible care for patients and their families.

Presenter: Dr. Daniel Ngui, Family Doctor, Vancouver, BC

Local Practitioners: Family Doctor