Health professionals' patterns of communication: cross-purpose or problem solving?

Area of Science:

• Healthcare Communication
• Pediatric Health
• Disability Studies

Background:

• Effective communication is crucial in healthcare, particularly in helping relationships.
• Problem-solving communication involves mutual respect, open sharing of facts/feelings, and non-judgmental feedback.
• The dynamics of parent-health professional interactions with handicapped children require investigation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess if parent-health professional interactions concerning handicapped children facilitate problem-solving communication.
• To analyze the communication patterns in parent-allied health professional and parent-physician dyads.

Main Methods:

• Utilized audiotaped interviews from 37 parent-allied health professional and 37 parent-physician dyads during regular appointments.
• Analyzed 6-minute segments from each interview, coded at 3-second intervals.
• Employed the Sequential Analysis of Verbal Interaction (SAVI) tool for communication behavior analysis by trained coders.

Main Results:

• Significant differences observed in messages and verbal behaviors between parents of handicapped children and health professionals.
• Communication patterns across all groups deviated from problem-solving, characterized as interpersonal and goal-oriented.
• Interactions were identified as cross-purpose, non-interpersonal, and non-goal-oriented.

Conclusions:

• Current communication between parents of handicapped children and health professionals is not conducive to problem-solving.
• There is a clear need for enhanced training in interpersonal communication skills for physicians and allied health professionals.
• Early and practical training interventions are recommended to improve healthcare interactions.