Word of Mouth Special on Medical Communication
Nov 02, 2008
Filed under
Health
I thoroughly recommend an excellent edition of Radio 4's 'Word of Mouth'
devoted to medical communication. It includes a lively discussion on
the pros and cons of 'teaching' communication skills. Shockingly, most
medical students emerge from medical school communicating less well
than when they started, communication having become ritualised at the
expense of sincerity.
The programme also includes a discussion
on how pain is talked about. Is a 'menu' of pain words helpful or is it
overly constraining? One patient, Elizabeth McClung,
explained how she finds the medical repetoire of pain words very
limited (stabbing, throbbing, burning, nagging, radiating) and unable
to cope with patients' metaphors. There are no easy answers, but the
programme is a thoughtful look at it all.
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