Now more than ever patients are taking control of their own health care, leaving many conventional physicians unsure about their role as dispensers of medical knowledge. More waiting rooms are now filled with highly informed medical consumers seeking to partner with their doctors. They want to explore all promising treatments, both mainstream and alternative, and connect emotionally. To physicians, these patients seem needy and demanding. They expect a lot of attention, but are all too quick to question authority and battle doctors for control of medical care. To patients, though, such physicians come off as distant and stodgy, even arrogant. Many walk away entirely from mainstream medicine seeking a better partnership or they neglect to mention the alternative treatments they're using for fear of disapproval. Less assertive patients simply clam up-put off by doctors' increasingly brusque bedside manner and shorthand use of ''medicalese.'' The unfortunate result in each case is the same: miscommunication and missed opportunities. Patients fail to receive the best care available to them, and doctor-patient relationships fall far short of the caring and mutually satisfying exchanges they should be.