A Contemporary Etymology of the American Medical Patient from 1980 to 2000

While most research on patients explores the patient-physician relationship, this paper examines the conceptualization and meaning of patients. Given this focus, my research explores the evolution of the meaning of being a patient. I use qualitative document analysis to examine the first meeting of the American Medical Association’s House of Delegates for each year from 1980 to 2000. I find that the use of the word patient includes both individualized and generalized terms that describe patients. I find that the generalized cases exist in both a medical and social form. I conclude proposing that a conceptualization of a patient using the social generalized form allows for future research on social phenomena to be undertaken in a shared language with physicians.