As a GP I found this article rather disheartening. You can't really gainsay a personal opinion but it seems misleading to suggest that the author or her friends walk into a GP consultation with no formulation of what's wrong. In my experience if people don't know they will have asked a friend or googled the symptoms, so why not get those ideas out for discussion up front? I've had the "well you're the bloody doctor" response, but in that case you just move on and try a different way: such a response in itself gives you information about the patient.
Consultations are about information sharing and negotiation. If you don't elicit and address the patient's worries early in the consultation you risk ploughing on with a diagnosis and management plan that the patient ultimately seems strangely reluctant to accept - because in fact they think you've got it wrong. So round the loop you go again. The doctor that the author describes with "gold-standard" communication skills was simply doing this in a slightly different way that the author happened to prefer.
Every doctor has their own style and it will suit some patients more than others. Through getting to know your patient you learn to modulate your personal style. Much as I hate acronyms and tick boxes I fully believe in the principle of ICE.
Rapid Response:
Re: I never asked to be ICE’d
As a GP I found this article rather disheartening. You can't really gainsay a personal opinion but it seems misleading to suggest that the author or her friends walk into a GP consultation with no formulation of what's wrong. In my experience if people don't know they will have asked a friend or googled the symptoms, so why not get those ideas out for discussion up front? I've had the "well you're the bloody doctor" response, but in that case you just move on and try a different way: such a response in itself gives you information about the patient.
Consultations are about information sharing and negotiation. If you don't elicit and address the patient's worries early in the consultation you risk ploughing on with a diagnosis and management plan that the patient ultimately seems strangely reluctant to accept - because in fact they think you've got it wrong. So round the loop you go again. The doctor that the author describes with "gold-standard" communication skills was simply doing this in a slightly different way that the author happened to prefer.
Every doctor has their own style and it will suit some patients more than others. Through getting to know your patient you learn to modulate your personal style. Much as I hate acronyms and tick boxes I fully believe in the principle of ICE.
Competing interests: No competing interests