Culturally Specific Patterns to Close a Medical Consultation in Jordan: A Conversation Analysis Case Study

Abstract

Closing is the last phase in a consultation in which participants will understand that the visit is almost done and some topic might be shifted to be discussed in the future visits. This phase is divided into two parts: preparing for closing, and the closing of the consultation which is the concern of the present paper. This article is a part of a large study examining the overall structure of doctor- patient interaction in a Jordanian university hospital. The present article focuses on the analysis of naturally occurring data by using conversation analysis (hereafter CA) framework. A deep analysis is performed to identify the patterns that construct the ending of the consultations. The findings reveal similarities in obvious features, such as ‘goodbye’ and ‘thanking words’, and cultural specific features to the medical consultations in a Jordanian university hospital, such as the use of religious greeting,‘in∫a Allah’ and ‘well wishes’.