crucial to those involved in healthcare education, practice and of course, to patients. Yet, responses to these questions are elusive (1-3). While we could say that the bad practitioner is one who practices badly, for example, one who fails in relation to specific competencies, the opposite does not seem to be entirely true (4-6). To achieve this objective, we interviewed Iranian patients through open-ended questions and examined their depictions of a ’good physician’. Whether physicians agree with the criteria defined by people or not is another issue that has also been addressed in this study. A comparison of physicians and patients’ views of a good physician can prove beneficial in training physicians and defining continuous education pro-grams.