Objectives: The patient-physician relationship is an important topic for any hospital.
The leadership behavior of physician may influence the culture of treatment teamwork and further more, it may affect the patient-physician relationship and performance of the physicians. The purpose of this study was to verify the relationship of leadership behavior, patient-physician relationship and physician performance.
Methods: The sample of this study came from a hospital. We used a structural questionnaire to collect the data, including leadership behavior of the physician, patient-physician relationship and physician performance. The questionnaire was filled in by physicians’assistants in the examination room of the Outpatient Department.
Results: The leadership style of consideration was significantly associated with the patient-physician relationship (Pearson’s r=0.87, p<0.001). The number of outpatients was significantly related to the initiating structure style (ANOVA, p=0.038). The staff’s satisfaction was associated with the leadership style of consideration (ANOVA, P<0.001). We further found this relationship was strongly positive in regression model ( beta=0.61, p<0.001, adjusted R2=78%).
Conclusions: We suggested the hospital could improve the patient-physician relationship by understanding the leadership behavior of the attending physician. The physicians with lower consideration were especially found in the groups that were working on improving their patient-physician relationship and satisfaction of staff.
