Michael and Enid Balint coined the term “patient-centered medicine,” and discussed this in one of their papers. Balint Groups provide a method to train doctors and other healing professionals how to apply a patient-centered approach.
Phillip Hopkins wrote in the introduction to the book “Patient Centered Medicine” in 1972:
“It has been claimed that patients are sometimes considered as mere objects of medical treatment, in that diagnosis and treatment are determined solely by the doctor on the basis of his assessment. So often, this leads only to dissatisfaction and failure. The needs of the patient may not be expressed in words and have to be discovered by the doctor's investigation and even intuition. To satisfy such a patient does not mean simply to satisfy the patient's expressed wishes, but to fulfill deeper, often unconscious, needs, the elucidation of which requires complex and refined techniques. The kind of medicine that takes into account these needs and satisfactions is well described as "patient-centered medicine", a phrase coined by Michael Balint..”