[Interactions between patients and physicians: why should we care about gender issues?]

This article presents the major findings of research on medical interactions from a gender perspective. Male and female physicians give the same amount of medical informations to their patients, but male physicians discuss less the psychosocial aspects of the illness. Male physicians ask less medical and psychosocial questions, and patients provide them with less information. Female physicians adopt more partnership-behaviors and display more affiliative nonverbal behaviors. Patients behave less dominantly with male than with female physicians. Finally, male patients are given less signs of empathy and receive less information, whatever the gender of the physician.