Medical practice and culture that respects and incorporates the concepts that the person is more than his or her disease and the professional is more than a scientifically trained mind using technical skills. People are more than their bodies. They are unique, interdependent relationships of body, mind, emotions, culture, and spirit. Each person has the capacity to define and be increasingly responsible for himself, the professional seeks to assist the patient in in taking and fulfilling his responsibility for himself; health and disease are not matters of the moment but have an intricate past, present and future; physical disease, pain, suffering, aging and even death can frequently be valuable, meaningful events in an individual’s life; and effective practice requires not just conventional skills but also effective development and use of human qualities such as intuition, inventiveness and empathy.