Pamela Foester It takes more than diagnosing and performing procedures to ensure your patients receive proper care. Communication between healthcare professionals and the doctor is crucial in determining the kind of care your patient receives.
Whether it is a minor ailment or a serious health condition, your communication with your doctor influences how good of a treatment you receive. Not many people realize this but having open communication with your doctor is crucial to your health.
This article will enlist various reasons why you should establish a strong communication channel with your healthcare professional.
Importance of Effective Communication with Your Healthcare Professional
Did you know that poor communication has been a major cause of wrongful deaths in the last five years? According to a report, more than 1700 people have passed away due to a lack of effective communication between them and their doctors.
To receive the best care and treatment for any health condition, it is important that you find doctors who are willing to listen, understand, and empathize with your health condition. Also, you must be able to reciprocate well and be able to answer openly and honestly when they query your condition and symptoms. This will lead to an effective communication channel between patients and their primary care doctors.
There are top reasons for a communication barrier between patients and doctors are mostly,
- Limited time
- Unrealistic patient expectations
- Lack of awareness
- Fear of physical and verbal abuse
Not having an effective communication structure with your doctor can have grave consequences. It will hinder your treatment process and make it difficult for doctors to give a diagnosis.
So, to ensure that patients receive optimal healthcare, you and your doctors need to pay attention to the importance of effective communication.
5 Reasons Why Effective Doctor-Patient Communication Is Imperative
Most of the time, patients that come to the doctor’s appointment are often anxious because they have no idea what they will find out about their health during the visit. On top of that, the fact that they aren’t aware of their condition also affects their communication skills or makes it difficult for them to ask the right questions to their healthcare provider.
So, here are a few reasons that will help you understand why talking to your doctor about your condition is critical.
-
Ensures Patient Safety
One of the most significant reasons why effective communication is imperative between a doctor and a patient is to ensure maximum protection for the patient. Inadequate communication is often the leading cause of a patient’s death in the healthcare sector.
So, to ensure that you are receiving the right treatment from your doctor, you must provide them with the right information. Otherwise, they won’t realize your health condition as adequately as they should.
-
Avoids Wrong Treatment
Your doctor will only know things that you tell them until they decide to conduct extensive tests. But even for that to happen, you must first inform them about your problem.
Your doctor can only prescribe accurate medication and get necessary tests done if they know your condition as accurately as possible. You also need to tell your doctor everything you want out of your remaining time in life if you have a serious health condition.
Don’t forget to document your needs and wants so the doctor can prescribe you a course that ensures maximum health benefits without many side effects.
Related: Health Benefits for Drinking Purified Water
-
Identifies Life-Long Health Risks Much Earlier
Another important reason why you must tell everything about your health condition to your doctor during a visit is so that they can identify life-long health risks if there are any.
In most cases, patients tend not to discuss their family history or allergies because they don’t deem it essential for the treatment. For instance, if you find a lump in your underarms or breasts, you must discuss this with your doctor and share any family history of breast cancer.
This way, the doctor can conduct a test to determine if your genetics pose any serious threat to your health and make decisions early.
-
Prevents Misunderstandings
When you discuss your health condition with your doctor, it avoids miscommunication that could make your case difficult.
With the help of effective communication, your doctor will not be left in the dark, and they will know precisely how to treat your condition. Sometimes, even a tiny detail can have major effects, so don’t forget to share everything about your condition with your primary healthcare provider.
-
Helps Replace Prescriptions
Lastly, if you’re under a medication that has been reactive to your health, it is another important issue that you must inform your doctor about.
It is quite normal for medicines to negatively react with any of your existing health conditions. You can sometimes have an allergic reaction which is okay, but you must let your primary doctor know. If you don’t inform them about your growing concerns regarding your health symptoms, they will never be able to opt for an alternate approach, which may cause your health condition to deteriorate.
Let your doctor know that you have reacted to a certain medication so they can change it in time.
FAQs
Why must I tell the doctor my every symptom even though I think it is unrelated to my condition?
Doctors need to understand the full picture of your health condition before arriving at a diagnosis or prescribing medicines. This requires that you present them with every symptom you face, and not exclude details that you think are unrelated.
Knowing every discomfort you face can help them prescribe the right medicines that don’t end up treating one condition at the cost of causing another.
What can I do to feel comfortable talking to my doctor?
Be more open and stay confident about your concerns. There is no shame in talking to your doctor about how you feel and how certain factors affect your health. Talk to them and let them know your concerns so they can treat you accordingly.
Final Thoughts
This is everything we have to say regarding the importance of communicating your health condition to your doctor. You see, if you don’t communicate with your primary care provider as openly as possible, they will never be able to treat you well.
They won’t know what your symptoms are and thus won’t be able to bring you the relief you richly deserve. So, to ensure you’re being treated precisely, you must discuss your health condition with your doctor.
