Short counseling techniques for busy family doctors

V H Poon¹

¹Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of Toronto.

Canadian Family Physician Medecin De Famille Canadien

|April 1, 1997

Abstract

Objective:

To introduce two short counseling skills for busy family doctors: the BATHE technique and the DIG technique.

Quality Of Evidence:

The BATHE technique indicates five areas for questioning patients who require counseling: background, affect, trouble, handling, and empathy. No research on use of the technique has been published. The DIG technique is the author's modification of the BATHE technique.

Main Findings:

While the efficacy of counseling in general was validated, more research on the effectiveness on these two techniques needs to be done.

Conclusions:

Since counseling is an integral part of family practice, family doctors will find these techniques useful. Each is easy to learn and takes less than 15 minutes to complete.