The Relative Deprivation And The Tension Between Doctors And Patients

In recent years, the doctor-patient relationship in China is becoming from bad to worse. Tensions between doctors and patients are manifested by the increasing number of conflicts, failure of solutions and the insufficiency of adequate protections. Previous studies attribute the aggravating tensions to the following reasons:the inadequate government input, system of covering the hospital expenses with the medicine revenue, incomplete medical insurance system, declined public spirit of public hospitals, excessive medical treatment, patients’ overrated expectations of the physician, overcharged medical services, increasing sense of participation, and the media misreport. In view of the history of medical service in foreign countries, China presents no uniqueness in all the abovementioned phenomena, which nevertheless lead to its exceptionally serious tensions. This puzzle urges a new explanation to China’s conflicting doctor-patient relationship. On this effort, this study suggests that the occurrence of the tension can be explained by the theory of relative deprivation.In the past decade, Chinese patients developed a sense of deprivation for three reasons:the termination of the communist welfare system, the market-oriented reform of the public hospital, and the decline of the public spirit. At last, the author also suggests some measures tackling the problem:1) to make relevant laws demarcating rights and responsibilities of doctors and patients;2) to improve the national health care insurance system3) to establish the medical professional liability insurance and etc.