Improving Surgical Residents’ Bedside Manner
I was alerted to this Archives of Surgery article (full reference below) by MedPage Today: Role Playing Boosts Surgical Residents’ Bedside Manner.
I find it intriguing. Role playing gives you a chance for a “do-over” when you make a social or communication faux pas.
So much of medicine is communication. Those of us who have been at it for years, deliver bad news differently (learned the hard way) now than we did previously. You choose your words more carefully (though I still occasionally screw up). Some words are more emotionally charged than others. Some patients want more information than others.
The University of Connecticut Health Center conducted a prospective study of a pilot project designed to teach surgical residents patient-centered communication skills.
The study offered Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Suture for a Living*