Teoría en la acción sobre la relación con el paciente. Una perspectiva diferente de representar y entender el comportamiento del médico de familia en la consulta

OBJECTIVE: To identify the «theory in the action», according to the concept of Argyris and Schon, in a group of Family Doctors and to examine whether this «theory» seems to be a valid representation of their behaviour, as well as a comparison with results of other studies. DESIGN: Descriptive, cross-sectional study. SETTING: Primary Care. PARTICIPANTS: Ten Family Doctors with a minimum of 10 years experience in Health Centres of a city and its surrounding area. METHOD: Intentional sampling was used to select the participants, according to age, sex, characteristics of the Health Centre, and style of practice style. Data was collected from recordings and transcription of self-recordings, as well as from observations in the consulting room. Inductive formulation and grouping of the propositions was performed from the identification of the behaviours in the consulting room and as well as their context following the proposals of Argyris and Schon. A comparison was also made of the propositions of the participants of this study and with those in the literature. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: The 84 propositions from the interviews were grouped into 9 topical categories, which in order of weight were: confidence / interest, prescribing medications, subjective dimension, direction, negotiation, distance, and information. The propositions of the first two topics are basically similar, while differences appear in the «theory in action» of various doctors. The propositions were comparable with the results of other studies. CONCLUSION: It is possible to formulate the theory in action of Family Doctors that appears to be an overall and coherent representation of their behaviour in the consulting room.