Teaching communication skills in an integrated curriculum.

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Communication Skills Training
• Psychology

Background:

• Effective communication is crucial for healthcare professionals.
• Developing advanced interpersonal skills, such as empathy and active listening, is essential for patient care.
• Existing training methods may not fully address the nuances of patient interaction.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effectiveness of a seven-week communication skills workshop for students.
• To assess improvements in empathic responding, questioning techniques, and self-awareness.
• To explore the correlation between self-awareness and enhanced communication abilities.

Main Methods:

• A seven-week workshop incorporating description, demonstration, practice, and application of communication skills.
• Utilized role-playing, faculty feedback, and clinical audiotaping for skill development.
• Employed student and faculty evaluations to gauge workshop effectiveness.

Main Results:

• Students demonstrated significant growth in empathic responding and identifying patients' underlying feelings.
• Improvements were observed in questioning skills, with a decrease in irrelevant questions and an increase in selective, open-ended inquiries.
• A positive correlation was found between increased self-awareness and enhanced communication skills, with students becoming more adept at critiquing their own interpersonal style.

Conclusions:

• The workshop effectively enhanced students' empathic communication and self-awareness.
• Systematic training, including small group practice and audiotaping, proved valuable for skill acquisition.
• Students and faculty reported high satisfaction with the workshop format and positive outcomes on patient behavior.