It is important that you consider the tone of your voice when talking to different people as some people maybe happy with you talking in a certain ‘jokily’ fashion however someone else may have a different issue and need their situation handling in a more serious manner. Staff need to be able to use their own judgements on how and what to say to make sure they are being sincere and using the correct tone of voice with each individual. Having good listening skills shows that you are concentrating on what they have to say and using appropriate gestures whilst they are communicating with you like nodding your head as this shows you are understanding and following what they are trying to say. Staff should ensure that they are treating people fairly, with dignity and making sure they have an opportunity to make their own choices. When the care workers are communicating they need to ensure they don’t come across patronising or sarcastic as this may give off a bad impression to the service user and make them feel slightly intimidated. When you are communicating it is good if you take it in turns as there won’t always be someone talking and someone listening as this is only a one way conversation and isn’t very helpful to communicate effectively. This enhances effective communication and equality of opportunity.
If you don’t know the topic that the service user wants to discuss then just for the sake of it you shouldn’t carry on the conversation as your lack of understanding may not be guiding them in the right direction, so you should then find someone who can help sort out their issue and leave them in someone else’s care. Therefore enhancing safety/security because if you are informing the service user how to go about sorting out a medical issue and you are not qualified to diagnose them but you still make them think they have some life threatening disease and they don’t by doing this you are putting their safety at risk. Effective communication can be enhanced if the service user knows that the professional does not know what he/she is talking about they may not want to talk about personal problems if they feel they are not being taken seriously.
Timing is a key aspect of communication as if you don’t have enough you shouldn’t rush through a conversation either rearrange the timings so you have enough or sort out another date when you can meet properly and talk through the matter, as this is the more professional way of handling time problems. Healthcare professionals shouldn’t discuss personal matters in unprofessional settings. For example where there is a lot of background disturbance and this could affect the way in which the service user would talk to you and how much of their personal problems they would share down a busy corridor shouting over people. In order to enhance the service users’ care values/rights it is important that the care worker maintains the dignity, privacy, safety/security and effective communication of the service user in this situation. The care worker can maintain the service users’ dignity by not shouting medical complications that the service user might have across people as this may not make the service user feel very comfortable especially if they are with friends or family. By using a private consultation room to discuss any concerns the carer or service user may have is a better way to enhance the service users’ rights. Shouting personal problems across public places can put the service users’ safety/security at risk as this would decrease their trust in the carer.
When you consider all these aspects discussed above you can gain the service users trust and respect and this is a good, open relationship to have between a service user and a care worker enabling the service user to be able to talk to the care worker about any problems they may have to share their concerns about. Having good relationships with your clients is very important because the service user won’t have to feel a barrier between them and can open up to the care worker more easily.
Password protection is also crucial as no one should know your password other than you and it must be changed regularly as if certain information gets into the wrong hands then it can be used unprofessionally and this is breaking the Data Protection Act. This enhances confidentiality, privacy and safety/security. It enhances confidentiality because by using passwords and changing them regularly it makes it harder for personal information to get into the wrong hands. If certain personal documents/information does get into the wrong hands then this could put the service users’ safety/security at risk.
Having different formats is also essential as there are people who have various impairments and they would need to access the same information as people who don’t have these impairments and they can be as leaflets in Braille or other languages. This enhances effective communication and choice as you are providing everyone who may need to use the same facilities as other people who don’t have impairments or communicating problems with the correct format that they would understand. If some hospitals/doctors surgeries don’t cater for the needs of these different needs and requirements it may be seen as an inhibitor to communication.
