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Updated: Apr 25, 2026

Using Visual and Narrative Methods to Achieve Fair Process in Clinical Care
Published on: February 16, 2011
Using a team-centered approach to evaluate effectiveness of nurse-physician communications
Objective:
To characterize communication strategies of labor and delivery nurses and their physician colleagues during perinatal decisions.
Design:
A quantitative descriptive design was used.
Setting:
A perinatal setting in an urban acute care facility.
Participants:
Twenty-nine perinatal nurses and 11 attending physicians.
Methods:
A model of team communication derived from research on cockpit crew communication served as a framework for this analysis. Data were taken from transcriptions of audio-taped conversations and discourse analysis.
Results:
Findings indicated that nurses and physicians tended to use status-based communication styles and rarely employed team-centered communication strategies.
Conclusion:
Nurse and physician status-based communication styles may hinder optimal patient outcomes.
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