Paternalistic vs egalitarian physician styles: the treatment of patients in crisis

Abstract

According to previous reports, the quality of the physician-patient relationship plays an important role in medical outcome. A patient's responsiveness to suggestions, perceptions of treatment, and physical distress may be affected both by the type of interpersonal relationship and by the patient's anxiety. To test these hypotheses, 57 women who received elective abortions were treated by the physician in either a "paternalistic" or "egalitarian" interpersonal style. Each patient was tested for responsiveness to suggestions regarding changes in somatic perception such as heat or pain; a measure of psychological dependency on the physician was also obtained in addition to ratings of discomfort and signs of physiological distress during the medical procedure. Patient anxiety was not related to any of these variables, but patients treated in a paternalistic manner had higher responsiveness to suggestibility (P less than .001), felt they could depend more on the physician and perceived him as warmer and more supportive (P less than .01), had less discomfort during the procedure (P less than .05), and had a lower incidence of physiological distress compared with patients treated in an egalitarian manner. It was concluded that, for patients in crisis, paternalistic treatment by a physician may promote positive psychological and medical outcome.