surrogate patient


surrogate patient

A normal, healthy individual who is employed to be examined and perhaps interviewed by health care students. The purpose is to provide students with the opportunity to examine an individual in a less stressful setting than would be the case if the person being examined were indeed sick. This also prevents persons who are ill from being subjected to multiple examinations by students. In some cases, the surrogate patient is an actor who has been instructed to pretend to be sick, injured, disabled, or hostile. See also: patient