Abstract

Over the course of recent years, matters of spirituality and religion have become a topic of great interest and debate in the medical world; the Southern Medical Journal, in fact, will investigate this debate in some detail in the months to come. In the vast majority of instances the issue has been examined largely by looking at the effects, both positive and negative, which such beliefs, or adherence to the rules of such belief systems, may have upon the health of the patient. In the original article by Curlin and coauthors,¹ however, this relationship has been investigated from another perspective that of the attending physician.