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Ethical issues of the mental health act
Doctor patient communication importance
Doctor patient communication importance
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Recommended: Ethical issues of the mental health act
My view on what Katz’s had to say is a little bit confusing, however, I seem to slightly understand what he’s saying. I would say that the book The Silent World of the Doctor and Patient that it’s dated and not at the same time. In today's, some people have great relationships with their doctors and some don’t. I think it depends on the individual and how much of a people person they are which goes for both patients and doctor. For example, I used to go to therapy when I was younger. It would take me at least two weeks to get used to the therapist before I start to open up to them. After letting them in we would have lovely conversations and I would tend to feel much better and became less depressed and stressed out. However, I personally think …show more content…
But communication I think goes both ways, for many reasons. I’ve seen people come to the doctor office and not tell the doctor everything that is going on with them until things get worse. I also have seen doctor diagnose patients and don’t treatment until something pops up. For example, I have an aunt who’s in the hospital now. She caught a mild stroke. When her daughter took her the nurse was told to run an EKG on her. The leads were not sticking and her daughter asked her if she needs help. The nurse told her no I got this and went through with the EKG, which came back normal. As a student who took EKG, I was taught that you are supposed to wipe the patient's skin off before placing the leads so they can stick. How are you supposed to get a proper reading if your leads are falling off? Then, the doctor told my cousin that her mother was fine that she can go home. My cousin looked at the doctor and told them, “don’t you see my mother mouth is twisted, her speech is slurred, and her hand swollen.” After she said that then the doctor looked and said, “oh yeah we’ll run and CT scan on her.” When the result came back they saw that she had a mild
One of the most complex, ever-changing careers is the medical field. Physicians are not only faced with medical challenges, but also with ethical ones. In “Respect for Patients, Physicians, and the Truth”, by Susan Cullen and Margaret Klein, they discuss to great extent the complicated dilemmas physicians encounter during their practice. In their publication, Cullen and Klein discuss the pros and cons of disclosing the medical diagnosis (identifying the nature or cause of the disease), and the prognosis (the end result after treating the condition). But this subject is not easily regulated nor are there guidelines to follow. One example that clearly illustrates the ambiguity of the subject is when a patient is diagnosed with a serious, life-threatening
Communication is cited as a contributing factor in 70% of healthcare mistakes, leading to many initiatives across the healthcare settings to improve the way healthcare professionals communicate. (Kohn, 2000.)
Patients deserve the full attention of their doctor. (Wilkinson) One of the things that is distracting health care professionals from paying attention to their patients is technology. Physicians can get so caught up with filling out forms and answering calls that they aren’t giving enough time to their patient. (Britt) A harmless solution to this problem is just asking the person to wait a few minutes, so the doctor can finish up what they’re doing and then be able to devote their full attention to the patient. There needs to be a balance between giving someone very little time and wasting too much time on one person. That’s why doctors not only need to focus but also remain in control. Often patients will ramble on about their problem even after the doctor has figured out what’s wrong. For a case like that, every doctor should have something prepared to say in order to go treat other patients.
Chew –Graham CA, May CR, Roland MO. Harmful consequences of elevating the doctor patient relationship to be a primary goal of the general practice consultation. Fam Pract. 2004: 21 (3):229-231.
In “Should Doctors Tell the Truth?” Joseph Collins argues for paternalistic deception, declaring that it is permissible for physicians to deceive their patients when it is in their best interests. Collins considers his argument from a “pragmatic” standpoint, rather than a moral one, and uses his experience with the sick to justify paternalistic deception. Collins argues that in his years of practicing, he has encountered four types of patients who want to know the truth: those that want to know so they know how much time they have left, those who do not want to know and may suffer if told the truth, those who are incapable of hearing the truth, and those who do not have a serious diagnosis (605). Collins follows with the assertion that the more serious the condition is, the less likely the patient is to seek information about their health (606).
Truth in medicine is a big discussion among many medical professionals about how doctors handle the truth. Truth to a patient can be presented in many ways and different doctors have different ways of handling it. Many often believe that patient’s being fully aware of their health; such as a bad diagnosis, could lead to depression compared to not knowing the diagnosis. In today’s society doctor’s are expected to deliver patient’s the whole truth in order for patients to actively make their own health decisions. Shelly K. Schwartz discusses the truth in her essay, Is It Ever Ok to Lie to Patients?. Schwartz argument is that patients should be told the truth about their health and presented and addressed in a way most comfortable to the patient.
Communication encompasses a wide range of processes such as the exchange of information, listening, posing of questions (Fleischer et al., 2009) or use of body language. In a healthcare environment where there are constant interactions among nurses, doctors, patients and other health professionals, professional and effective communication is important in ensuring high quality healthcare standards and meeting the individual needs of patients.
Understanding that all patients needed to be treated justly and given the opportunity to make decisions in their care is important. Not causing harm and preventing them from harm is also the duty of health care workers. These ethical principles are essential to keep in mind with interdisciplinary communication. Ineffective communication has been associated with medical errors, patient harm, and increase length of stay. Failure to communicate properly has been associated with 79% of sentinel events (Dingley, Daugherty, Derieg & Persing, 2008). Good communication has been shown to improve patient satisfaction, increase in patient safety, as well as a decrease in health care costs (Paget et al.,
In conclusion, doctors have a moral obligation to tell patients the truth about their illnesses, unless the patient clearly states that he or she does not want to know. Medicine is a field that works to treat the patient. This means that physicians are there for guidance, using expertise and years of education to guide them to a cure. This does not mean that a physician should make decisions about the patients without proper consent. Believing that patients will misunderstand the diagnosis, or assuming that they won’t want to know are not valid reasons for keeping information from the person. Communication is important in a medical setting, and is especially important when talking about the health of an individual. With relevant, appropriate and humanistic communication, telling a patient their diagnosis can and should be done in a caring way.
Communication plays a major role in preventing and resolving behavior problems and enhancing your patient’s quality of life by allowing them to feel, even when they no longer know or recognize those around them that they are in the midst of people who care about them and are concerned about their physical and emotional well being.
Communication plays a vital role in all areas of healthcare, yet its importance is often overlooked. Whether it is a doctor talking to patients about treatment options, or strangers comforting one another in a waiting room, communication is happening everywhere and almost always, we underestimate how important it is and how it truly affects our medical experience. In the movie The Doctor, this is exactly what happens, causing a whirlwind effect of emotions and learning.
Patient confidentiality is one of the foundations to the medical practice. Patients arrive at hospitals seeking treatment believing that all personal information will remain between themselves and the medical staff. In order to assure patients privacy, confidentiality policies were established. However, a confidentiality policy may be broken only in the case the medical staff believes that the patient is a danger to themselves or to others in society. Thesis Statement: The ethics underlying patient confidentiality is periodically questioned in our society due to circumstances that abruptly occur leaving health professionals to decide between right and wrong.
Communication involves relaying information from an individual to another through the use of verbal and nonverbal techniques. Many factors affect the effectiveness of information relay. It involves evaluating verbal aspects such as tone of voice, the emotional content being communicated, the timing and rapport of the interaction with patients, and nonverbal techniques such as facial expressions, time invested. It is necessary for productive and satisfactory work environment, improved patient outcomes, and settling conflicts. The purpose of this paper is to identify issues with ineffective communication and ways to improve proper communication throughout the a hospital’s interdisciplinary team and patients.
The doctor patient relationship is an important connection. Doctor-patient confidentiality is based on the idea that a person should not care for medical treatment because they fear the state will share with others.
Street, Richard, MD. (1992). “Analyzing Communication in Medical Consultations: Do Behavioral Measures Correspond to Patient’s Perceptions?”. Medical Care, 30, 976 - 987