Skills for Communicating with Patients

Silverman, Jonathan; Kurtz, Suzanne; Draper, Juliet

doi:10.1201/9781910227268

Cited by 453 publications

(490 citation statements)

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“…INTRODUCTION Social scientists' collaboration with clinicians over three decades has shown that good communication underlies effective health care, 1 has established communication curricula in clinical training, 2 and has generated guidance about how to communicate with patients across clinical situations from meeting new patients to breaking bad news. 3,4 In particular, several decades of research and associated curriculum and policy development have embedded communication training and guidance in cancer care internationally, [5][6][7][8][9][10] with curricula sponsored by governments and major health providers being widely disseminated to cancer clinicians. [11][12][13] Nevertheless, recent reviews find little evidence that cancer patients benefit after clinicians are taught communication.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A new paradigm for clinical communication: critical review of literature in cancer care

Salmon

Young

2016

Med Educ

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ObjectivesTo: (i) identify key assumptions of the scientific ‘paradigm’ that shapes clinical communication research and education in cancer care; (ii) show that, as general rules, these do not match patients’ own priorities for communication; and (iii) suggest how the paradigm might change to reflect evidence better and thereby serve patients better.MethodsA critical review, focusing on cancer care. We identified assumptions about patients’ and clinicians’ roles in recent position and policy statements. We examined these in light of research evidence, focusing on inductive research that has not itself been constrained by those assumptions, and considering the institutionalised interests that the assumptions might serve.ResultsThe current paradigm constructs patients simultaneously as needy (requiring clinicians’ explicit emotional support) and robust (seeking information and autonomy in decision making). Evidence indicates, however, that patients generally value clinicians who emphasise expert clinical care rather than counselling, and who lead decision making. In denoting communication as a technical skill, the paradigm constructs clinicians as technicians; however, communication cannot be reduced to technical skills, and teaching clinicians ‘communication skills’ has not clearly benefited patients. The current paradigm is therefore defined by assumptions that that have not arisen from evidence. A paradigm for clinical communication that makes its starting point the roles that mortal illness gives patients and clinicians would emphasise patients’ vulnerability and clinicians’ goal‐directed expertise. Attachment theory provides a knowledge base to inform both research and education.ConclusionsResearchers will need to be alert to political interests that seek to mould patients into ‘consumers’, and to professional interests that seek to add explicit psychological dimensions to clinicians’ roles. New approaches to education will be needed to support clinicians’ curiosity and goal‐directed judgement in applying this knowledge. The test for the new paradigm will be whether the research and education it promotes benefit patients.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A new paradigm for clinical communication: critical review of literature in cancer care

Salmon

Young

2016

Med Educ

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“…It is therefore unclear how attachment style and EI may influence more 'complex' PPC, such as that required to effectively balance the often competing tasks of biomedical and psychosocial information gathering. 40 The purpose of the current study, therefore, was to validate the model by exploring the influences of Year 2 medical students' attachment styles and EI on their PPC with SPs in an OSCE in which a more complex skill set is assessed. It was hypothesised that Year 2 medical students' EI will mediate the negative influence of their attachment avoidance on their PPC.…”

Section: Methods Year 2 Medical Students Completed Measures Of Attachmentioning

confidence: 99%

Validating relationships among attachment, emotional intelligence and clinical communication

2014

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“…1,7,8,9 Patients may employ different lexical items than health-care professionals for the same concept, 3 also referred to as patientese, 5 or alternatively associate different quantities as well as kinds of information with specialist terms. 8,10 In keeping with such concerns, health-care professionals are often advised to avoid medical terminology when communicating with patients 1,2,11 ; instead, they should translate medical jargon into lay-friendly lexis. 6 The on-going relevance of such general recommendations requires investigation in the light of the fact that growing numbers of patients are accessing health resources on the Internet, 12 gaining familiarity with medical terms in the process.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Medical terminology in online patient–patient communication: evidence of high health literacy?

Fage-Butler

Jensen

2015

Health Expectations

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BackgroundHealth communication research and guidelines often recommend that medical terminology be avoided when communicating with patients due to their limited understanding of medical terms. However, growing numbers of e‐patients use the Internet to equip themselves with specialized biomedical knowledge that is couched in medical terms, which they then share on participatory media, such as online patient forums.ObjectiveGiven possible discrepancies between preconceptions about the kind of language that patients can understand and the terms they may actually know and use, the purpose of this paper was to investigate medical terminology used by patients in online patient forums.DesignUsing data from online patient–patient communication where patients communicate with each other without expert moderation or intervention, we coded two data samples from two online patient forums dedicated to thyroid issues.ResultsPrevious definitions of medical terms (dichotomized into technical and semi‐technical) proved too rudimentary to encapsulate the types of medical terms the patients used. Therefore, using an inductive approach, we developed an analytical framework consisting of five categories of medical terms: dictionary‐defined medical terms, co‐text‐defined medical terms, medical initialisms, medication brand names and colloquial technical terms. The patients in our data set used many medical terms from all of these categories.Discussion and conclusionsOur findings suggest the value of a situated, condition‐specific approach to health literacy that recognizes the vertical kind of knowledge that patients with chronic diseases may have. We make cautious recommendations for clinical practice, arguing for an adaptive approach to medical terminology use with patients.

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Skills for Communicating with Patients

Cited by 453 publications

References 0 publications

A new paradigm for clinical communication: critical review of literature in cancer care

A new paradigm for clinical communication: critical review of literature in cancer care

Validating relationships among attachment, emotional intelligence and clinical communication

Medical terminology in online patient–patient communication: evidence of high health literacy?

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