[Gifts from patients: to accept or not?]

Most physicians receive gifts from their patients during their careers, but what to think of these presents and how to react to them? For many years, generous patients led to uneasiness: they might expect special services from the physician; or other patients - who did not give anything - could feel disadvantaged over generous patients. These are good reasons not to be too keen on gifts. They still lead to uneasiness now, but the situation has nevertheless been reappraised as it goes against the general tendency to complain about everything: a token of appreciation is welcome. We should keep in mind that many patients have sincere intentions when giving presents. Just as in our clinical decision-making, we should trust our common sense when appreciating and accepting presents. However, verbal or written expressions of gratitude are preferable to physical presents since the former ones are far less complicated.