Communication Skills

Prognostication of acute neurologic disease is a major task for neuro-hospitalists and neuro-intensivists. The family conference raises the delicate matter of how to decide that outcome is indefinitely poor and how to define disability. This online resource guides practitioners on how to communicate prognosis in acute neurologic conditions. It includes useful data on prognosis in all major neurologic conditions and provides practical advice on how to effectively lead such a conference and how to resolve potential conflicts. It also provides straightforward common sense on-the-spot advice and touches on all aspects of support of devastated families.Less

This valuable tool, written by experts, offers practical guidance in the principles of consent, alongside procedure-specific information on risks and benefits

Motivational interviewing (MI) is among the most powerful tools available to promote behavior change in patients. In an age of chronic diseases (diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, obesity), behavior change is no longer limited to substance use or the field of psychiatry - maladaptive choices and behaviors that negatively impact health outcomes are rampant. This online resource explores how MI enhances contact with patients from every level of training, following an accessible, succinct approach, how to apply the MI method and skills into practice, includes numerous clinical scenarios, personal reflections, and online animated clinical vignettes (video clips), all of which can be integrated into regular ward rounds and office visits to provide an effective and efficient approach to patients’ clinical encounters.Less

This comprehensive, evidence-informed text provides clinicians, researchers, policy-makers and academicians, with content to inform and enrich the guidelines recommended by the National Consensus Project and the National Quality Forum Preferred Practices. It is designed to meet the needs of health social work professionals who seek to provide culturally sensitive biopsychosocial-spiritual care for patients and families living with life-threatening illness. Edited by two of the leading social work clinician-researchers in the US, this text serves as the definitive resource for practicing clinicians and fulfils the need for social work faculty who wish to complement general health care texts with information specific to palliative and end-of-life care.Less

Patient-Centered Medicine: A Human Experience emphasizes the health professional’s role in caring for patients as unique individuals by focusing on patients’ psychological and social realities as well as their biological needs. The text concerns itself with caring for the whole patient, and outlines the basic principles (acceptance, empathy, conceptualization, and competence) involved in developing a biopsychosocial approach to medical practice. This is a volume of guidelines to help you to develop and master the following: basic attitudes (awareness, disorganization, and reorganization) and interviewing skills; the realization that the experience of illness depends on the person, challenges of illness, coping, problem patients, the nature of the healing process, touching, healing and the biopsychosocial model, medicine’s existential quest, and desiderata. According to Andrew Weil, MD, “Patient-Centered Medicine: A Human Experience is a timely and welcome publication …. Integrative medicine also emphasizes the importance of the practitioner–patient relationship in the healing process…. Medical students and doctors in training will find it especially useful” (Foreword, this edition) According to Norman Cousins, “[this is] a book filled with compassion and insight … attach the highest value to your science… it is our respect for the human soul that determines the worth of our science” (Foreword, 1st edition).Less

The Textbook of Palliative Care Communication is the authoritative text on communication in palliative care, providing a compilation of international and interdisciplinary perspectives. The volume was uniquely developed by an interdisciplinary editorial team to address an array of providers, including physicians, nurses, social workers, and chaplains, and unites clinicians and academic researchers interested in the study of communication. By featuring practical conversation and curriculum tools stemming from research, this text integrates scholarship and inquiry into translatable content that others can use to improve their practice, teach skills to others, and engage in patient-centered communication. The volume begins by defining communication, explicating debatable issues in research, and highlighting specific approaches to studying communication in a palliative care context. Chapters focus on health literacy and cultural communication; patient and family communication; barriers and approaches to discussing palliative care with specific patient populations; and discussing pain, life support, advance care planning, and quality of life topics such as sexuality, spirituality, hope, and grief. Team communication in various care settings is outlined, and current research and education for healthcare professionals are summarized. Unique to this volume are chapters on conducting communication research, both qualitatively and quantitatively, to promote further research in palliative care.Less