Physicians’ decision-making style and psychosocial outcomes among cancer survivors

ObjectiveWe evaluated pathways linking physicians’ decision-making style with cancer survivors’ health-related quality of life (HRQOL).MethodsWe analyzed survey data from 623 survivors diagnosed with leukemia, colorectal, or bladder cancer in Northern California, 2–5 years prior to the study. Of these, 395 reported making a medical decision in the past 12 months and were asked about their physician's decision-making style. We evaluated the association of physician style with proximal communication outcomes (trust and participation self-efficacy), intermediate cognitive outcomes (perceived control and uncertainty), and distal health outcomes (physical and mental HRQOL).ResultsOverall, 54% of survivors reported a sub-optimal decision-making style for their physician. With the exception of physical health, physician style was associated with all proximal, intermediate, and distal outcomes (p ≤ 0.01). We identified two significant pathways by which a participatory physician style may be associated with survivors’ mental health: (1) by increasing survivors’ participation self-efficacy and thereby enhancing their perceptions of personal control (p < 0.01); (2) by enhancing survivors’ level of trust and thereby reducing their perceptions of uncertainty (p < 0.05).ConclusionA participatory physician style may improve survivors’ mental health by a complex two-step mechanism of improving survivors’ proximal communication and intermediate cognitive outcomes.Practice implicationsPhysicians who adopt a participatory decision-making style are likely to facilitate patient empowerment and enhance patients’ HRQOL.