patient practitioner relationship

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Tyler O’Sullivan PJM

Reviewing research on the patient practitioner relationship

A variety of studies have explored the patient practioner relationship. In this review article I will look at the findings from a range  of studies and explore how this can be used by University medical schools in the training of students.

McKinstry and Wangs study, conducted in 1991, found that patients had a higher level on confidence in Doctors and health professional that maintained professional dress codes as opposed to Doctors who attended consultations dressed informally. When training medical students it would be useful to inform them that appearance can be a significant factor in reassuring a patient. Along with a formal dress sense drawing upon Argyle’s findings in 1975 another important factor in maintaining patient confidence is to maintain good non verbal contact relations – such as eye contact and facial expressions.

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Taylor’s study found that verbal communication with a patient is not addressed with much success during medical training and suggested three reasons for this: no agreement on what makes a positive consultation, good communication may create a sensitive doctor unable to make tough decisions and thirdly the belief that a Doctor is already busy enough without the stress of worrying about their verbal communication. Whilst this may be a reason not to incorporate verbal communication in medical students training, the research of DiMatteo and DiNicola found that verbal communication could be improved substantionally with an improvement in common courtesy – ...

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