The patient–physician relationship: an account of the physician’s perspective

Abstract

Background: The issue of patient-physician relationships in general, and particularly the trust of patients in their primary care physician has gained much interest in academia and with practitioners in recent years. Most research on this important topic, however, focused on how patients view the relationship and not how the physicians see it. This research strives to bridge this gap, with the resolution of leading to an improved appreciation of this multifaceted relationship. Methods: A survey of 328 actively practicing physicians from all four health maintenance organizations (HMOs) in Israel resulted in a hierarchical formation of components, indicating both the relative as well as absolute importance of each component in the formation of the patient-physician relationship. The sample conducted was a convenience one. Methodologically, we used two different complementary methods of analysis, with the primary emphasis on the Analytic Hierarchical Processing (AHP), a unique and advanced statistical method. Results: The results provide a detailed picture of physicians' attitudes toward the patient-physician relationship. Research indicates that physicians tend to consider the relationship with the patient in a rather pragmatic manner. To date, this attitude was mostly referred to intuitively, without the required rigorous investigation provided by this paper. Specifically, the results indicate that physicians tend to consider the relationship with the patient in a rather pragmatic manner. Namely, while fairness, reliability, devotion, and serviceability received high scores from physicians, social interaction, friendship, familial, as well as appreciation received the lowest scores, indicating low priority for warmth and sociability in the trust relationship from the physician's perspective. The results showed good consistency between the AHP results and the ANOVA comparable analyses. Conclusions: In contrast to patients who traditionally stress the importance of interpersonal skills, physicians stress the significance of the technical expertise and knowledge of health providers, emphasizing the role of competence and performance. Physicians evaluate the relationship on the basis of their ability to solve problems through devotion, serviceability, reliability, and trustworthiness and disregard the "softer" interpersonal aspects such as caring, appreciation, and empathy that have been found to be important to their patients. This illustrates a mismatch in the important components of relationship building that can lead to a loss of trust, satisfaction, and repeat purchase.

Patient-centered care: achieving higher quality by designing care through the patient’s eyes

“…Interestingly and with similar findings, Berger et al [ 14 ] performed a sophisticated study of Israeli physicians’ perceptions of the physician-patient relationship. They analyzed survey responses of almost 300 physicians and concluded, “In contrast to patients who traditionally stress the importance of interpersonal skills, physicians stress the significance of the technical expertise and knowledge of health providers, emphasizing the role of competence and performance.…”

Healthcare Providers and Outpatients Relationship: A Study of Three Selected Public Hospitals in Sokoto Metropolis

“…Patients are expected to derive some satisfactory benefits from this kind of cosmopolitan setting. Patients trust to healthcare providers on the other hand was also expected primarily (Berger et al, 2020) and necessarily. This is noticed as being one of the key qualities to assess the performance of facilities and a yardstick to prove the potentiality of the system, whether it has worked well or otherwise.…”

“…According to Umar et al, (2011), the complete satisfaction of patients lies in the efficiency and the potentiality of a relevant organization to deliver effective services. Lack of favorable circumstances, enabling environment or lack of satisfaction (Akunne et al, 2019); lack of cordial relationship lead to loss of trust and satisfaction (Berger et al, 2020). On the same note, resulted in substantive number of patients rejecting as well as showing lack of interest in patronizing a particular healthcare center.…”

“…In the same vein, large number of patients suffers from exhaustive queues, discriminatory attitudes and practices, long waiting T time (Umar, 2011) and verbal abuse by healthcare providers ( Neill and obarein, 2014). Physicians considered patients in pragmatic manner (Berger et al, 2020). In some cases, negligence for duty and fiduciary led to injury to the patient or patient's death (Akunne et al, 2019).…”

“…In some cases, negligence for duty and fiduciary led to injury to the patient or patient's death (Akunne et al, 2019). No doubt, the social interaction between physicians and patients' recorded low (Berger et al, 2020). These unsatisfactory practices of healthcare providers are regarded as maltreatment of patients (Bernhart et al, 1999).…”