Trust is a component of healthcare that is absolutely necessary for
the industry to succeed. The entire industry functions only if patients
trust in their providers’ ability to assist them. While yes, there are
hundreds of hoops and hurdles that hospitals and providers must go
through prior to becoming an accredited facility, the success of the
organization comes down to their patients trusting them.
This environment creates an interesting market where the consumer
isn’t able to fully understand the product before “purchasing”; it is
solely based on faith in the physician. Maynard and Bloor comment
on this topic with their quote; “An additional complication to the
agency relationship between doctor and patient is that the patient
may be unable to judge the performance of the doctor, before or
even after an intervention. This limits the potential of performance-
related pay in addressing the problem of incomplete agency, since it
is difficult to pay doctors on the basis of improvements in patient
health.” (Maynard & Bloor, para. 7, 2003). This particular
environment raises the question; do patients have too much trust in
the medical system?
This is a difficult question to answer as there are many different
components that go into building trust. Advancements in technology
and science have made once complicated procedures into simple
tasks covered by advancements in medical instruments. The patient
must be able to place their trust in the physician, the science, or the
technology. The organization’s job becomes one of selling trust to
the patient.
Placing too much trust into medical science alleviates the pressure
that medical facilities have to perform well. If medical professions
become accustomed to not needing to work for a patient’s trust,
quality and standards may begin to fall. It is important that patients
continue to do their research in order to keep providers accountable,
and the delicate nature of the healthcare market intact.
References
Maynard, A., & Bloor, K. (2003). Trust and performance management
in the medical marketplace. Journal of the Royal Society of
Medicine, 96(11), 532–539. https://doi.org/10.1258/jrsm.96.11.532
