Physicians ’ Communication Skills are Overlooked and Undervalued

By HANS DUVEFELT Interviewing celebrities can make you a celebrity yourself, and it can make you very rich. So there’s got to be something to it or it would be a commodity. The world of media certainly recognizes the special skill it takes to get people to reveal their true selves.  At the other end of the spectrum of human communication lies our ability to explain and also our ability to influence. These three aspects of what we do—elicit, explain and influence—are far from trivial, and in my opinion quite fundamental aspects of practicing medicine.  Eliciting an accurate patient history or administering standardized depression, anxiety, domestic abuse, smoking and alcohol screenings are commoditized activities in today’s healthcare. There is little time allotted and these tasks are usually delegated to non-clinicians.  A complicated patient’s clinical history seldom lends itself to straightforward, structured EHR formats. It can be more like a novel, where seemingly unrelated subplots converge and suddenly make complete sense in a surprising last chapter.  Explaining something well requires more than knowing your subject. First of all, sometimes we may have a very limited understanding, like a draft horse with blinders: He may know every turn of his route, but not know much of the potential distractions on either side. Second, if we are too entrenched in the scientist’s world view, we may not be able...
Source: The Health Care Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Medical Practice Physicians Hans Duvefelt health communication Physician Communication Source Type: blogs