Health Care Roles in Communication - Essay Example

Running head: HEALTH CARE ROLES IN COMMUNICATION Health Care Roles in Communication Module: Health Care Roles in Communication Communication is quite an important aspect in the healthcare industry as it enables provision of quality services to the patient while at the same time making the health care personnel’s work much easier and efficient. Proper flow of information among all the players in health care is the key to identifying what the problem is and ensuring that the intervention measures put in place will be effective. Indeed, the care of patients in health care facilities involves many individuals who need to share the patients’ information and proposed management (Touissant & Coiera, 2005). It is thus important that all the key players in health care: patients, care givers, friends and family, and medical assistants practice proper communication if at all their needs and desires are to be satisfied. The best way to study communication in health care is through case studies, where each component and their roles are analyzed. The scenarios also give information about the barriers in communication and implications, which enable one to come up with recommendations on what should be done to create effective communication. For this specific study, the scenario selected is that of Lena, where the major components in health communication will be identified, all the parties and their roles and perspectives in communication studied, the implications determined and a resolution for effective communication affecting all the players generated. Description of the Scenario Lena is a student who has stayed in America for about 10 years. She has however been raised in the cultural ways of Southeast Asia, her native land. She finds herself in the emergency room of a hospital one day after fainting in class-too much disappointment and vilification of an accompanying friend; Susie, who we also understand to have brought her to the hospital. She believes she does not need the services of a hospital and is prepared to leave but is restrained by a medical assistant informed by Susie. The impatient medical assistant is interrupted by a doctor who then tries to explain to Lucy the condition and gather more information from her. Lucy’s lack of cooperation makes the doctor to grow impatient and leave the room. From this scenario, it is possible to describe the major components of health care; we first have the patient Lucy who is in the hospital due to fainting suddenly while at school; there is the health care giver, in this case a doctor; a medical assistant who happens to be nearby the patient; and lastly Susie, a friend accompanying Lucy to the hospital. This scenario lacks clear and recognizable promotion of collaborative communication system in terms of verbal, nonverbal and environmental means. This can be demonstrated by the fact that when the doctor arrives, he casually interrupts and dismisses the medical assistant without any decorum or procedure. the way the medical assistant deals with Lucy, claiming that he does not have time for patients in her mind-frame is proof enough that the facility lacks institutional guidelines of communicating with patients, or if there are any then they are largely ignored. When the doctor realizes that his efforts are in futility, he leaves without providing direction to the patient’s friend Susie and one can only ponder on the degree of confusion that arises later. In case of uncooperative patients, healthcare facilities should have put in place strategies to deal with the situation including training their staff for such scenarios. This is clearly lacking in this case as both the doctor and medical assistant fail to gain cooperation from Lena. Perspectives of the key players in the situation The key players in these scenario are identified as; Lena, the patient, Susie, the friend; a medical assistant; and a doctor. Their perspectives and interactions have a direct impact on the effectiveness of communication achieved. These perspectives are influenced by several factors according to each player. The patient Lena has been raised on the cultural background of Southeast Asia which presumably shuns medical care and prefers personal strength in its place. It is clear that she is not happy with being in a hospital and feels that this is a suggestion that she is weak and cannot manage to overcome the condition by herself. Her perspective of institutional healthcare is that it is for weak people, and that strong people do not need hospital care. This perspective has the effect of making her difficult to deal with as a patient; on finding that she is in a hospital, she vilifies her friend Susie and tries to live the facility. The doctor clearly tries to give medical attention to her but she is largely uncooperative, ignoring the doctor’s efforts and not answering the questions directed at her. Her perspective also has the negative consequence of hindering medical intervention. Lena believes that she only needs strength to deal with an ailment; she is not interested in knowing what she is suffering from, the etiology or what condition she currently is in. The patient’s socialization and personal character also make it difficult to influence her perspective as she does not allow communication or reasoning with her. She makes it clear that Susie already knows her views on health issues and should not have brought her to the hospital, making it clear that there is no room for negotiation on it. She does not pay attention to what the doctor is saying and also fails to answer the doctor’s questions. This creates a situation in which she is impervious to other perspectives of thought, meaning she remains and persists with what her culture decrees to be ‘right’. This stubbornness denies her the chance to learn other ways of thinking and reasoning in terms of health care, hence she is bound to always think that institutional medical care is for the weak. The doctor The doctor first tries to calmly handle Lena, informing her of her condition and trying to gather the relevant information so that medical care can be administered as appropriate. However, the patient is not cooperative, ignoring the doctor’s briefing and failing to answer the questions. The doctor as a result becomes impatient and leaves the patient. The perspective of the doctor thus is he should only deal with cooperative patients since they are interested in getting well; those not cooperating should be ignored. The doctor also ignores the fact that may be talking to Susie, the friend, may help in bridging the communication barrier with the patient. The doctor’s handling of the medical assistant is dismissive, without enquiry as to what is going on. This is the reason he is oblivious to the fact that Lena is not cooperative, knowledge that would have made the doctor find an alternative approach that might have worked. Emotional stress results in burnout and many other negative consequences, including absenteeism and impaired group cohesion. This all lead to decreased quality of patient care in hospitals (Jones et al, 2003). Other studies indicate that emotional stress may result in a decrease in ability to perform tasks by health care givers accompanied by anxiety and apathy towards the job which lowers their concern for the patient and may greatly affect the state of health care (Wong et al, 2007). This is definitely one of the reasons behind the doctor’s impatience after realizing the patient is not cooperative, and a big contributory factor towards the doctor’s perspective that he should only treat cooperative patients. The friend Susie on the other hand has a different perspective towards health care to Lena’s. When Lena fainted she brought her to the hospital and even after the patient rebukes her for this and tries to leave the hospital she still calls the medical assistant to restrain Lena from doing so. Her behavior exhibits trust in medical, and that although she knows Lena’s views on the same, she is not prepared to let her not get medical help. This shows that her interaction and relationship with Lena- where she seems to be on the receiving end- does not affect her perspective of the situation. The medical assistant The medical assistant’s approach of the patient leaves a lot to be desired. He or she claims that he does not have time to deal with such a case and insists to the patient that she is sick and needs to stay in the hospital. No enquiry is made as to why the patient wants to leave, and besides such a reaction would further alienate a patient in such a state of mind. The perspective of the medical assistant is that there is simply no time to deal with emotional patients; all patients are sick and should cooperate without question. His attitude and behavior portrays an individual who is poor in social and communication skills, and perhaps stressed from work overload. While the medical assistant’s job description probably includes dealing with such patients, it might make them feel lowly which when coupled with the doctor’s dismissive treatment builds up his perception; his job is already difficult enough and he does not wish to handle a difficult patient. Communication implications Factors contributing to poor communication To begin with, the strongly held biomedical and biopsychosocial perspectives of the key players play an important role in the breakdown of communication in this case study. The doctor, medical assistant and the friend are of the view that there is a medical basis to Lena’s condition and do not deem it necessary to debate it, while Lena is convinced that she can overcome her condition through strength. No one is ready to give ear to the other, as we can see that the medical assistant and the doctor are not interested in knowing why she is uncooperative, and Lena is not ready to listen to what the doctor has to say. In such a situation, communication is virtually impossible to occur. The roles of the patient, the doctor and the medical assistant also contribute to the degenerate communication. This scenario closely follows the mechanic- machine model, where the care giver focuses on the medical problem without getting involved in the emotional state of the patient. We see a situation in which the doctor and the medical assistant are not interested in the patient’s perspective; the medical assistant tells her that she is sick and needs to stay in hospital without enquiring why she wants to leave. Meanwhile the doctor goes directly to the patient’s condition and does not enquire about her reasons for not cooperating. This creates a situation where no exchange of information between the two parties as the patient feels ignored and disregarded. The patient’s strongly held cultural views are a major barrier to communication. She has been raised on her native culture in which it is viewed as weak to seek medical help hence she cannot cooperate with the care givers. She does not allow for debate and is convinced that her traditions are right that she does not consider it worthy to express her views to the care givers. When she is prevented from leaving the hospital, she resorts to ignoring the doctor instead of expressing her views, which greatly impedes communication and by extension services from the doctor. It is obviously difficult to change perspectives that have been taught to a person all her life especially with the approach adopted by the health care givers in this situation. The image we get of the facility is that there is a lack of clear communication guidelines. The institution is under-supportive of its staff in terms of communication amongst themselves and with the patients. The doctor interrupts the medical assistant without any form of harmonized protocol and dismisses him. Ideally, the doctor should have first enquired from the medical assistant on what was the situation which would have perhaps placed him in a capable situation to deal with the difficult patient. There is also a total disregard of the accompanying friend, who might have offered important insight into the patient’s perspective of health care and forewarned them of what reactions to expect from Lena. The rude approach of the medical assistant to the patient and the doctor’s manner of leaving is further demonstration that there is a lack of institutional support to communication. Health care givers are always bound to come across uncooperative patients, and as a result should have put in place measures to enhance communication for example through training sessions for their personnel. Communication reforms It is clear that communication is the key to a functional and effective health care system, which means that interventions have to be undertaken in a case like Lena’s. There are several recommendations that if properly practiced may improve communication in a health care facility. The communication attributes of the health care givers needs to be addressed, meaning they should be careful about the image they portray through their tones, body language and gestures and facial expressions. These characteristics determine what patients view as your attitude towards them and as a result may make them uncooperative or aggravate already uncooperative ones. Habits such as leaning back in chairs, yawning, checking the time, shifting your body and shuffling feet are indicative of disinterest, impatience and boredom while avoiding eye contact and frowning indicate anger and suspicion (Communications, n.d). such habits should be done away with in case effective communication is to be achieved. The personnel interrelationships in health care systems should be improved for communication to flow properly and to present a good image in the eyes of the patients and their friends or family. Teamwork is important in such an industry involving this much extent of information exchange. It creates rapport and appropriate respect among them and cases of casual dismissal and rude interruptions are avoided. Organization culture improvements that increase cooperation among staff lead to efficient collection and sharing of relevant data from the patient and dissemination of proposed interventions to all parties concerned. Modern health care technologies can contribute to improved systems of communication. Interpersonal communication, which is important in interaction among all stake holders in healthcare, can be transformed through intelligent manipulation of technology (Sands, 2008). Adoption of systems such as instant messaging, email, video conferencing, web-based real time collaboration and fax are some of the proposed methods that can greatly improve communication in a health care facility. Institutional policies also need to be put in place in a bid to optimize communication. This involves adoption of medical reforms including health care communication technologies, encouraging teamwork among staff, recruiting social support groups, conducting relevant training employees, environmental restructuring and improving organizational culture. This shows that the institution is perhaps the most important in improving communication and as a result should be the first to take the initiative. Conclusion There fact that communication is very important in health care cannot be overstated further. The best way to study the state of communication systems currently in place and whether they are effective is by performing a case study and analyzing the perspectives and roles of all players involved and the implications on communication. The key players identified in a typical scenario are the patients, doctors, medical assistants and friends or family to the patient. All of these players contribute to either functional and effective communication or a broken one. Some of the factors that stand out as contributing to communication breakdown include strongly held cultures, care giver attitudes, communication attributes, institutional policies and personnel interrelationships. To address broken communication, health care institutions should lead the way in adoption of teamwork, training, communication technologies, social support groups and encouraging care givers to adopt better communication attributes and attitudes towards patients. References Communications, (n.d), Communication skills for health care providers. Retrieved August 28, 2011 from http://slincs.coe.utk.edu/lpm/ky/health_manual/comm_skills1.pdf Green, M. A. & Bowie, M. J. (2005). Essentials of health information management: Principles and practices. Clifton Park, NJ: Thomson. Jones, D., Tanigawa, T. & Weiss, S. M., (2003). Stress management and workplace disability in the US, Europe, and Japan. Journal of Occupational Health. 45(1): 1-7 Sands, D. Z. (2008). Challenges in Healthcare Communications: How technology can increase efficiency, safety, and satisfaction. Cisco. Retrieved August 28, 2011 from http://www.cisco.com/web/about/ac79/docs/wp/Communication_Healthcare_WP_0724FINAL.pdf Touissant, P. J. & Coiera, E. (2005). Supporting communication in health care. Int J Med Inform. Pubmed. 74:779–81. Retrieved August 28, 2011 from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1579411/ Wong, D. et al. (2001). Mental health of Chinese nurses in Hong Kong: The roles of nursing stresses and coping strategies. Online Journal of Issues in Nursing. 5-2. Retrieved August 28, 2011 from http://www.nursingworld.org/ojin/topic12/tpc12_7.htm Read More