Communication Opinion
February 3, 2015
HCS/320

Communication is and will always be a big necessity in our daily lives. Whether it is at work or home, communication will help in the success in getting things done. According to State of Washington (n.d.), “communication is defined as a process by which we assign and convey meaning in an attempt to create shared understanding. This process requires a vast repertoire of skills in intrapersonal and interpersonal processing, listening, observing, speaking, questioning, analyzing, and evaluating. Use of these processes is developmental and transfers to all areas of life: home, school, community, work, and beyond.”

While communicating, effective communication is an important element during the process. Effective communication is how the message is interpreted and heard or understood. This is all part of the flow to successful communication. The first step in this would be good listening skills. Listen with verbal and nonverbal skills by always facing them and maintaining eye contact. Let them speak without interruptions. Next always be aware of emotions or if being stressed during communication. Emotional awareness can provides the tools for understanding all parties involved including oneself and the real messages that are being conveyed.

The communication in the health care field is at most similar. Along with effective communication, health care communication is how we process and share health information. This is influenced by personal goals, skills, cultural orientation, situation factors, and people’s feelings (du Pre', Chapter 1, 2005). These communicators are doctors, nurses, aids, caregivers, and even us as we can be considered as a caregiver to someone. Communication in health care is important so that the proper care is given and understanding the needs and well-being of the patient. With today’s technology, it helps people get information about their health and research for more education for knowledge and prevention. Being able to have this access can give confidence to the patient when seeing their doctor or when receiving care. Most time patients are reluctant to talk about “all” the issues with their health. Most time people experience barriers in communicating the way they should because of trust issues with the provider or lack of compassion.

When in health care, it is important that providers or all health care professionals should have an approach that caters to different patient situations and behaviors. If a doctor has good “bedside manners” and speaks at a level that is comforting and compassionate, then the patient would open up more and speak in detail on their issues. Most doctors and health care professional forget that when they are speaking with clinical vocabulary, they lose the confidence of the patient and most likely that patient will not follow through with the care plan because they were too overwhelmed to ask question to better understand. Asking open ended question with time taken to listen would help draw more information openly.

There are times when barriers are the factors that set back or interrupt healthcare communication. Most of these barriers of communication are differences in language, cultural differences and low health literacy. By