Perceived Communication Skills Among Tertiary Care Physicians

Self-perception in clinical skills, including communication skills (CS), has been found to provide insights on strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities for skill improvement. The present study is aimed at exploring perceived CS among physicians working at a tertiary healthcare level.

Physicians working at a tertiary hospital based in Saudi Arabia were invited to complete a modified self-questionnaire that assesses CS. Descriptive and association studies were performed. Psychometric properties of the questionnaire were determined.

Out of the 101 participating physicians, 57.2% rated their CS in the range of very good and excellent, but only 30.7% rated themselves as overall excellent. The question item with the highest mean score (score range, 1 to 5) was related to encouraging patients to ask questions (4.2 ± 0.9), while the lowest was for the item that assessed information disclosure (3.8 ± 0.8). Males rated themselves higher than females in the item related to explaining things to patients (p < 0.05), whereas physicians with non-surgical specialties rated themselves better than those with surgical specialties in the item related to expressing interest in patients (p < 0.05).

Based on physicians' self-rated assessment, less than the third of tertiary care physicians considered themselves as maintaining an excellent level of CS. Future studies are encouraged to examine CS through a multisystem assessment and promote the need for CS training for physicians working at a tertiary care level.