Lian, OS, Nettleton, S, Grange, H and Dowrick, C 
ORCID: 0000-0002-4245-2203
(2022)
“I'm not the doctor; I'm just the patient”: Patient agency and shared decision-making in naturally occurring primary care consultations
Patient Education and Counseling, 105 (7).
pp. 1996-2004.
ISSN 0738-3991, 1873-5134
Abstract
Objectives: To explore interactional processes in which clinical decisions are made in situ during medical consultations, particularly the ways in which patients show agency in decision-making processes by proposing and opposing actions, and which normative dimensions and role-expectations their engagement entail. Methods: Narrative analysis of verbatim transcripts of 22 naturally occurring consultations, sourced from a corpus of 212 consultations between general practitioners and patients in England. After thematically coding the whole dataset, we selected 22 consultations with particularly engaged patients for in-depth analysis. Results: Patients oppose further actions more often than they propose actions, and they oppose more directly than they propose. When they explain why they propose and oppose something, they reveal their values. Patients’ role-performance changes throughout the consultations. Conclusion: Assertive patients claim – and probably also achieve – most influence when they oppose actions directly and elaborate why. Patients display ambiguous role-expectations. In final concluding stages of decision-making processes, patients usually defer to GPs’ authority. Practice implications: Clinicians should be attentive to the ways in which patients want to engage in decision-making throughout the whole consultation, with awareness of normative dimensions of both process and content, and the ways in which patient's actions are constrained by their institutional position.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | Humans, Physician-Patient Relations, Decision Making, Patient Participation, Referral and Consultation, Primary Health Care, Decision Making, Shared |
| Divisions: | Faculty of Health & Life Sciences Faculty of Health & Life Sciences > Inst. Population Health |
| Depositing User: | Symplectic Admin |
| Date Deposited: | 09 Jun 2022 11:30 |
| Last Modified: | 24 Jan 2026 03:27 |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.pec.2021.10.031 |
| Open Access URL: | https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pec.2021.10.031 |
| Related Websites: | |
| URI: | https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3156124 |
| Disclaimer: | The University of Liverpool is not responsible for content contained on other websites from links within repository metadata. Please contact us if you notice anything that appears incorrect or inappropriate. |
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