Constructing the Moral Foundation of the Medical Service Market:Discourses on Consultation Fees and Professional Ethical Adjustments of the Western Medicine Doctors in the Period of Republic of China
The modern market exchange of medical services for money and the professional ethics of the medical profession with"altruism"as its core characteristic constitute a tension,and the adjustment of this contradiction has become one of the key aspects of professionalization.This paper utilizes the discussion of consultation fees in the period of Republic of China(ROC)and analyzes the ethical and cultural work done by doctors'groups to construct the ethical foundation of the medical service market from the theoretical perspective of relational work.They clarified the ethical foundation of consultation fees and made a careful distinction between medical care and general labor,commerce,and charity,so as to construct a specific ethical connotation of consultation fees.However,this effort to reconfigure the nature of medical services and the doctor-patient relationship around consultation fees encountered challenges at the intersection of the old and the new ideologies.This paper has significant implications for the current doctor-patient relationship,the reform of the healthcare system,and even the construction of professional ethics in many other professions.