The patient brings to the clinical encounter a story, the history of present illness (HPI). As the physician listens to the story, a special kind of relationship begins to form. It is often charged with deep felt emotion by the patient - fear and anxiety, anger, sadness, or a combination of these. As we suggested in Part One of this symposium, when the physician attends to the patient's story, both its biomedical content and the emotions with which it is told, a special therapeutic relationship is born. This relationship is the basis of all future interactions between physician and patient.
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