In recent years,doctor-patient conflicts occurred frequently in China.It is crucially important to raise medical students' awareness and understanding on the nature of doctor-patient communication and improve their communicative competences.In order to investigate the current situation of communication between doctors and patients of chronic diseases and generate implications on teaching medical students about doctor-patient communication,this study explored type 2 diabetes patients' perceptions and expectations of their communication with doctors.16 Chinese diabetes type 2 patients were enrolled.Semi-structured one-to-one in-depth interviews were conducted.Subjects were encouraged to expand their narration on communication with their doctors.Interview results shows that patients' general evaluation on doctor-patient communication is positive,however dissatisfaction exists in areas including the contemporary medical system,medical advancement,doctor competence,doctor' s attitudes,and manner of communication.It is concluded that communication between diabetes type 2 patients and their doctors is found problematic in two aspects:task-focused behaviors are in need of refinement and enrichment,as the current information exchange is found to be far from enough;the social-emotional behaviors are totally neglected in communication.Suggestions on educating medical students and improving their communication competences are generated from the study.