Although trust has significant implications for health outcomes, the mechanisms by which its presence or absence influences these outcomes require elucidation. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in southeast Australia, we explore the tasks of rehabilitation for people who lost a limb because of vascular disease, and the importance of trust in the relationships of patients with their health professionals. Trust underpins procedures and practices designed to minimize problems that might delay rehabilitation or result in the continuing need for medical support and surveillance. Patients develop trust in the rehabilitation team based on three factors: competence, agency, and caring. Our findings emphasize how social skills, as well as technical competence, enable health professionals to gain and maintain their patients’ trust.
Adams, V. ( 2001). Particularizing modernity: Tibetan medical theorizing of women’s health in Lhasa, Tibet. In L. Connor & G. Samuel (Eds.), Healing powers and modernity: Traditional medicine, shamanism, and science in Asian societies (pp. 222-246). Westport, CT: Bergin & Garvey. doi:10.1080/1364847022000075415
Barbot, J., & Fillion, E. ( 2006). "Defensive medicine": Critique of a successful concept . Sciences Sociales Et Sante, 24(2), 5-33. doi:10.1002/14651858
4.
Becker, G. ( 1998). Disrupted lives: How people create meaning in a chaotic world. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
5.
Becker, G., & Kaufman, S.R. ( 1995). Managing an uncertain illness trajectory in old age: Patients’ and physicians’ views of stroke. Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 9(2), 165-187. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/649115
6.
Berwick, D.M. ( 2003). Errors today and errors tomorrow. New England Journal of Medicine, 348, 2570-2572. Retrieved from http://content.nejm.org/cgi/reprint/348/25/2570.pdf
7.
Bogner, M.S. ( 1994). Human error in medicine. Hillside, NJ: Erlbaum.
Brownlie, J., & Howson, A. ( 2005). "Leaps of faith" and MMR: An empirical study of trust . Sociology, 39(2), 221-239. doi:10.1177/0038038505050536
10.
Calnan, M., & Rowe, R. ( 2007). Trust and health care. Sociology Compass , 1, 283-308. doi:10.1111/j.1751-9020.2007.00007.x
11.
Calnan, M., & Rowe, R. ( 2008). Trust, accountability and choice. Health, Risk & Society, 10, 201-206. doi:10.1080/13698570802063125
12.
Charmaz, K. ( 1991). Good days, bad days: The self in chronic illness and time. Piscataway, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
13.
Ciechanowski, P., & Katon, W.J. ( 2006). The interpersonal experience of health care through the eyes of patients with diabetes. Social Science & Medicine , 63(12), 3067-3079. doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2006.08.002
14.
Clarke, P., Kelman, C., & Colagiuri, S. ( 2006). Factors influencing the cost of hospital care for people with diabetes in Australia. Journal of Diabetes and Its Complications , 20(6), 349-355. doi:10.1016/j.jdiacomp.2005.08.004
15.
Davis, P., Lay-Yee, R., Fitzjohn, J., Hider, P., Briant, R., & Schug, S. ( 2002). Compensation for medical injury in New Zealand: Does "no-fault" increase the level of claims making and reduce social and clinical selectivity?Journal of Health Politics Policy and Law, 27(5), 833-854. doi:10.1215/03616878-27-5-833
16.
Dumas, A., & Turner, B. ( 2006). Age and aging: The social world of Foucault and Bourdieu . In J. A. Powell & A. Wahidin (Eds.), Foucault and aging (pp.145-155). New York: Nova Science.
17.
Eagar, K., Gordon, R., Hodkinson, A., Green, J., Eagar, L., Erven, J., . . . Rigley, A. ( 1997). The Australian national sub-acute and non-acute patient classification (AN-SNAP): Report of the national sub-acute and non-acute casemix classification study. Wollongong, Australia: University of Wollongong.
18.
Elster, J. ( 2007). Explaining social behavior: More nuts and bolts for the social sciences. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.
19.
Feldmann, C.T., Bensing, J.M., de Ruijter, A., & Boeije, H.R. ( 2007). Afghan refugees and their general practitioners in the Netherlands: To trust or not to trust?Sociology of Health & Illness, 29, 515-535. doi:10.1177/0734016809332095
20.
Frank, A.W. ( 1995). The wounded storyteller: Body, illness, and ethics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
21.
Goldsmith, J., Wittenberg-Lyles, E., Rodriguez, D., & Sanchez-Reilly, S. (2010). Interdisciplinary geriatric and palliative care team narratives: Collaboration practices and barriers . Qualitative Health Research, 20, 93-104. doi:10.1177/1049732309355287
22.
Good, M.J.D. ( 1995). American medicine: The quest for competence. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
23.
Gubrium, J.F., Rittman, M.R., Williams, C., Young, M.E., & Boylstein, C.A. (2003). Benchmarking as everyday functional assessment in stroke recovery. Journal of Gerontology B: Psychological Sciences & Social Sciences, 58(4), S203-S211. doi:10.1093/geronb/58.4.S203
24.
Hardin, R. ( 2002). Trust and trustworthiness. New York : Russell Sage Foundation.
25.
Healy, J. ( 2002). Australia. In A. Dixon & E. Mossialos (Eds.), Health care systems in eight countries: Trends and challenges (pp.3-16). London : London School of Economics and Political Science .
26.
Hedstrom, P. & Swedberg, R. ( 1996). Social mechanisms. Acta Sociologica, 39(3), 281-308. doi:10.1177/ 000169939603900302
27.
Hsieh, E., Ju, H., & Kong, H. ( 2010). Dimensions of trust: The tensions and challenges in provider-interpreter trust. Qualitative Health Research, 20, 170-181. doi:10.1177/1049732309349935
28.
Hunter, C., Spence, K., & Scheinberg, A. (2008). "Untangling the web of critical incidents": Ethnography in a paediatric setting. Anthropology & Medicine, 15(2), 91-103. doi:10.1080/13648470802122016
29.
Kleinman, A. ( 1988). The illness narratives: Suffering, healing, & the human condition. New York: Basic Books.
30.
Kuipers, J.C. ( 1989). "Medical discourse" in anthropological context: Views of language and power. Medical Anthropology Quarterly3(2), 99-123. doi:10.1177/1473325005058642
31.
Lee, Y.Y., & Lin, J.L. ( 2009). The effects of trust in physician on self-efficacy, adherence and diabetes outcomes. Social Science & Medicine, 68(6), 1060-1068. doi:10.1097/ CHI.0b013e3181b76683
32.
Lim, T.S., Finlayson, A., Thorpe, J.M., Sieunarine, K., Mwipatayi, B.P., Brady, A., . . . Angel, D. ( 2006). Outcomes of a contemporary amputation series. Australian & New Zealand Journal of Surgery, 76(5), 300-305. doi:10.1007/ s00190-002-0216-2
33.
Markovic, M., Manderson, L., & Quinn, M. ( 2004). Embodied knowledge and the search for diagnosis. Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 18(3), 376-396. doi:10.1525/ maq.2004.18.3.281
34.
Mattingly, C. ( 1994). The concept of therapeutic "emplotment."Social Science & Medicine, 38(6), 811-822. doi:10.1177/1463499603003002006
35.
Mechanic, D. ( 1998a). The functions and limitations of trust in the provision of medical care. Journal of Health Politics Policy and Law , 23(4), 661-686. doi:10.1215/03616878-23-4-697
36.
Mechanic, D. ( 1998b). Public trust and initiatives for new health care partnerships . Milbank Quarterly, 76, 281-302. doi: 10.1111/1468-0009.00089
37.
Mechanic, D., & Meyer, S. ( 2000). Concepts of trust among patients with serious illness . Social Science & Medicine, 51(5), 657-668. doi:10.1016/S0277-9536(00)00014-9
38.
Möllering, G. ( 2001). The nature of trust: From Georg Simmel to a theory of expectation, interpretation and suspension. Sociology, 35(2), 403-420. doi:10.1017/S0038038501000190
39.
Mullis, J. ( 1995). Medical malpractice, social-structure, and social-control . Sociological Forum, 10(1), 135-163.
40.
Pearson, S., & Raeke, L. ( 2000). Patients’ trust in physicians: Many theories, few measures, and little data. Journal of General Internal Medicine , 15(7), 509-513. doi:10.1177/1049732309349935
41.
Pham, D.T., Fortin, F., & Thibaudeau, M.F. (1996). The role of the health belief model in amputees’ self-evaluation of adherence to diabetes self-care behaviors. Diabetes Educator, 22(2), 126-132. doi:10.1177/0145721706298308
42.
Propp, K.M., Apker, J., Zabava Ford, W.S., Wallace, N., Serbenski, M., & Hofmeister, N. (2010). Meeting the complex needs of the health care team: Identification of nurse-team communication practices perceived to enhance patient outcomes. Qualitative Health Research, 20, 15-28. doi:10.1177/1049732309355289
43.
Ray, J.A., Valentine, W.J., Secnik, K., Oglesby, A.K., Cordony, A., Gordois, A., . . . Palmer, A.J. ( 2005). Review of the cost of diabetes complications in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Spain. Current Medical Research and Opinion, 21(10), 1617-1629. doi:10.1185/030079905X65349
44.
Riessman, C.K. ( 1990). Strategic uses of narrative in the presentation of self and illness: A research note. Social Science & Medicine , 30(11), 1195-1200. doi:10.1177/104973239400400405
45.
Sarradon-Eck, A. ( 2007). The meaning of adherence. Ethnography of medication practices in hypertensive patients. Sciences Sociales et Sante, 25, 5-36. doi 10.1684/sss .2007.0201
46.
Sztompka, P. ( 2007). Trust in science. Journal of Classical Sociology, 7, 211-220. doi:10.1177/1468795X07078038
47.
Tate, D.G., & Forchheimer, M. (2002). Quality of life, life satisfaction, and spirituality: Comparing outcomes between rehabilitation and cancer patients . American Journal of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation , 81(6), 400-410.
48.
Warren, N., & Manderson, L. ( 2008). Constructing hope: Dis/ continuity and the narrative construction of recovery in the rehabilitation unit. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 37(2), 180-201. doi:10.1177/0891241607312493
49.
Wikan, U. ( 1990). Managing turbulent hearts: A Balinese formula for living . Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
