Duden 91: "In a modern practice the aim of a doctor-patient interrelationship is predetermined, at least on the surface: the doctor is expected to make a diagnosis and to treat and cure the diagnosed illness. The women in Eisenach wanted neither of these things [...] There was a whole spectrum of what the sick and their families wanted"
"advice, prescriptions, continuous treaments, visits -- an incredible density and variety of possibilities"
"the women sought comfort in the symbolic act of the doctor's interpretation [...] It often seemed to me that what was actually going on in this practice was this kind of ritualistic confirmation"