Medicine: Grandeur and threat

A critical and constructive discussion of the Janus-face of modern medicine is presented. Its image of the human being and of the physician are viewed as a source of grandeur as well as a threat. After sidelights on the grandeur of modern medicine and its impressive advances, attention is focused on the threats hanging over it: the predominance of patriarchal norms with corresponding neglect of matriarchal paradigms, headlong technologic progress with atrophy of the spiritual dimension, and the dangers of inflated knowledge and specialization. Finally, an attempt is made to look ahead to a humane future medicine which has evolved in three ways: a bridge has been thrown between the scientifico-technologic and spiritual culture; it has broadened its present predominantly pathogenetic view into a salutogenic view, and it has also broadened the image of the physician.