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Researching medical trust in the United States

Mark A. Hall (Wake Forest University, Winston‐Salem, North Carolina, USA)

Journal of Health Organization and Management

ISSN: 1477-7266

Article publication date: 1 September 2006

1748

Abstract

Purpose

This article reviews research in the USA bearing on trust in physicians and medical institutions.

Design/methodology/approach

This article provides a conceptual analysis, and general review of the literature.

Findings

Empirical research of medical trust is burgeoning in the USA, and a fairly clear conceptual model of interpersonal physician trust has emerged. However, most studies focus on individual patients and their physicians, due to the highly individualistic attitudes that prevail in the USA. Lacking are studies of more social dimensions of trust in broader medical institutions. A conceptual model of trust is presented to help draw these relevant distinctions, and to review the US literature. Also presented are the full set of trust scales, developed at Wake Forest University, which follow this conceptual model. These conceptual categories may differ, however, in other languages and cultures.

Originality/value

The considerable body of research in the USA on patients' trust in individual physicians should help inform and focus international efforts to study social trust in medical institutions.

Keywords

Citation

Hall, M.A. (2006), "Researching medical trust in the United States", Journal of Health Organization and Management, Vol. 20 No. 5, pp. 456-467. https://doi.org/10.1108/14777260610701812

Publisher

:

Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2006, Emerald Group Publishing Limited

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