Crossing the Rubicon. Preparing residents for professional life after residency.

In addition to clinical skill and knowledge of basic science, graduating residents need decision-making and communication skills, and an understanding of the cultural and prejudicial divides that sometimes create conflicts and misunderstandings in the clinical arena. This paper summarizes a program that one institution has adopted, which attempts to introduce topics in the humanities into the conventional curriculum. The goal is to enable graduating residents to think and to express their views more creatively and assertively, and to give them a greater understanding of some of the individual and cultural attitudes they are certain to encounter in practice.