The series of seminars of the Research Group "Doctor-nurse-patient relationship: between professional authority and the powers of consumers of medical services" has been completed!

On July 3, 2024 a seminar was held on the topic "Trusted communication between doctor and patient: an example of young doctors", organized within the framework of the Research Group "Doctor-nurse-patient relationship: between professional authority and the powers of consumers of medical services".

Photo by Caroline LM on Unsplash

During the seminar, Victoria Somova, a master student and member of the Research Group presented the results of a qualitative study with dentists-surgeons of cities with millions and large cities. The main focus of the study is on the practice of building trust-based communication between young surgeons and patients.

Young surgeons, in the course of communicating with patients, resort to the use of partner and paternalistic communication models, but also, depending on the type of patient, they can combine these models or avoid communication on their own initiative. When choosing relevant communication models and practices, young doctors focus on the social status of the patient (marginalized individuals are singled out as a separate group; the high and middle and lower income levels are differentiated), the age group of the patient (youth, middle-aged patients and the elderly), the emotional mood of the patient and the severity of the disease.

The crisis of trust between young doctors and patients is caused by two main reasons: a crisis of institutional trust in medicine and personal distrust of a young surgeon. Institutional distrust arises against the background of a growing perception of medicine as a service sector, as well as excessive government interference in the doctor-patient relationship. Personal distrust is caused by the young age of the doctor, the insufficient number of similar operations performed, as well as the timidity and constrained behavior of young specialists. Interim conclusions were formulated based on the results of the initial stage of thematic coding of 7 interviews with young dental surgeons from cities with different populations.

Ekaterina Sharepina, lecturer at the Department of Demography, junior researcher at the Scientific and Educational Laboratory of Socio-Demographic Policy at the A.G. Vishnevsky Institute of Demography, was the debater at the seminar. Ekaterina shared valuable ideas about the possibilities of refining the study. First of all, the speaker should delve deeper into the context of empirical research in this field in order to better understand how research contributes to academic discussion. According to the debater, it is worth returning to the operationalization of concepts and describing more precisely the content of practices and models of doctor-patient communication.

We thank all participants of the seminar for their questions and comments!

The recording of the seminar will be available soon via the link.