ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors analyze the idea of the masks of the Japanese doctor, so that they can understand how the role of the doctor has been defined in Japan. They considers this investigation together with the Japanese hospice movement. Science has had a strong influence on the modern image of Japanese doctors and in the development of their social status. In the seventeenth century during the Edo period, doctors were in a low social class together with carpenters and other craftsmen. Doctors may continue to have authority in hospice care, since the traditional doctor-patient relationship will be extended to hospice care units from other units inside the same hospital. The status of the doctor was becoming higher at the time of arrival of the Meiji Period because, firstly, the concept of intelligence was changed with the introduction of Western science and technology; and secondly, doctors began to take action to improve their social position.
