Background: Disclosing medical errors is considered necessary by patients, ethicists, and health care professionals. Literature insists on the framing of this disclosure and describes the apology as appropriate and necessary. However, this policy seems difficult to put into practice. Few works have explored the function and meaning of the apology. Objective: The aim of this study was to explore the role ascribed to apology in communication between healthcare professionals and patients when disclosing a medical error, and to discuss these findings using a linguistic and philosophical perspective. Methods: Qualitative exploratory study, based on face-to-face semi-structured interviews, with seven physicians in a neonatal unit in France. Discourse analysis. Results: Four themes emerged. Difference between apology in everyday life and in the medical encounter; place of the apology in the process of disclosure together with explanations, regrets, empathy and ways to avoid repeating the)