ISSN: 2639-2038
Authors: Turabian JL*
Health surveys are commonly used to measure morbidity, but this type of instrument is not exempt from errors and difficulties. An alternative is the use of the data generated in the general practitioner's office, which can be especially useful. However, one aspect that has not been taken into account is the doctor-patient relationship in the consultation. The doctor-patient relationship is a professional, complex, multiple and heterogeneous social relationship. The models of doctor-patient relationship, depending on the interrelationship established between doctor and patient, imply different decision-making models (diagnostic and treatment). Since the symptoms are subjective evidences of health problems, and are expressed differently according to the context of the doctor-patient relationship, this variable limits the degree to which the physician obtains psychosocial information from the patient, and involves different diagnoses, and finally this has epidemiological consequences in morbidity data (prevalence and incidence of diseases and their distribution in the population). It is concluded that the processes of doctor-patient relationship play a mediating role between health resources and the outcomes of clinical encounters, and is an aspect of great importance in the treatment of patients, but also, in the epidemiological information. Due to the fact that doctor-patient relationship is a theoretically analyzed concept, but little studied, it would be important to try to characterize the distribution of the types of doctor-patient relationship that occur in the general medicine practice, in order to correct the epidemiological results or data of the diseases in the community.
Keywords: General Practice; Family Medicine; Physician-patient communication; Physician-Patient Relations; Framework; Decision Making; Diagnosis; Clinical Diagnosis; Uses of Epidemiology; Epidemiology; Prevalence; Morbidity; Medical Research; Public Health.
