How do children of doctors experience medical treatment by their parents? Results of a qualitative study

Achim Mortsiefer, Christine Kersting, Vera Kalitzkus, Annabel Zemke, Stefan Wilm

Keywords: Family Medicine; relatives; doctor-patient-communication; Doctor's family

Background:

In Germany, there are no official recommendations for doctors when providing medical treatment to their own relatives. Empirical studies show that hardly any physician can avoid this issue and that the treatment of relatives is associated with complex ethical problems. This also applies to children of doctors, who are very often treated by their parents. Little is known about children's views on medical treatment by their parents.

Research questions:

The aim of this work is to contribute to the scientific and ethical debate on the medical treatment of doctor's own relatives by adding the perspective of children.

Method:

Qualitative interview study with 13 young adults whose mother and/or father was or is a medical doctor. The guided interviews were recorded on tape and transcribed for analysis. A qualitative content analysis according to Kuckartz was carried out in MAXQDA, which was supplemented by open coding and validation sessions with a group of experts.

Results:

Informal treatment outside of routine care was frequently reported, with both positive (constant availability) and negative (incomplete treatment) aspects being mentioned. The respondents often felt that their parents did not take their own illness seriously. Nevertheless, they expressed total trust in the medical competence of their parents - even in cases of incorrect treatment that were reported several times.

Conclusions:

In the interviews, the role conflicts (patient vs. child) in children of doctors become clear. This can lead to a collision between the requirement to respect parental authority and the developing attitude of a mature, self-confident patient. Parents' handling of illness in the family is often described as trivialising or purely “medically professional”, which could indicate that the doctor's children are not receiving enough emotional attention. The topic of medical treatment of one's own relatives should be given greater consideration in medical education and training.

Points for discussion:

What are the experiences of medical treatment of children by their parents in the different countries?

How should doctors behave when their own children are ill?

What should a guideline on this topic contain?

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